


Isaac Beamer Versus the Supernatural

by OneBizarreKai



Category: Undertale (Fandom), Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: A hint of parody, AU - School Setting, Characters are Human, Characters have human names, Characters to be added, Comedy, Dramatic Shenanigans, F/F, F/M, Gen, Has very little to do with actual Undertale, Inevitable Relationships, M/M, Other, Shipping Jokes, Supernatural Elements, but really
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-04
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2018-08-29 01:39:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 45,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8470636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OneBizarreKai/pseuds/OneBizarreKai
Summary: Ink earned his nickname from looking like your run-of-the-mill shut-in artist at school. He had no friends, he spent all of his time in the art room, and no one really knew that much about him. But little do they know, he has an unbelievable secret. He has the power to make his drawings come to life!All had been going well for him, until suddenly, Error–the most popular boy in school–revealed the fact that he also has unique powers and refuses to leave Ink alone, making his life significantly harder. Problems have only continued to show up since, and that combined with them being aggressive high schoolers who have no idea how to socially function, it’s a recipe for disaster.





	1. Enter School King

“Hey, loser!”

Ink was minding his own business, when suddenly he collided with the lockers. He turned to see who the offender was, and it was one of the loserish jocks from the popular group, one of the bullies from the group, to be specific. Really, they just followed around their wonderful ‘leader’ around like a bunch of lackeys and did whatever he demanded. This probably had something to do with it.

“Ugh, what do you want this time?” Ink asked. “I’m kinda busy here.”

“Don’t screw around, you little punk,” the jock guy said. “Emphasis on the word ‘little’.”

“Sorry, I learned to embrace being short. I’m surprised that you know the word _emphasis_ , though,” Ink commented.

The jock guy made an ugly face. “I would punch out your lights right now if I wasn’t here on important business,” he retorted. “The boss is requestin’ for you for some reason, conscious and mostly unharmed.”

Ink scoffed. “Requesting for me? But I’m a _loser_ ,” he said, talking like a stereotypical bully on the last word.

“Look, I don’t got the reasons, ya weirdo. You better drop what you’re doing and come with or else we’ll needa take drastic measures.”

Ink raised an eyebrow. “Come with? Come with where?”

“To the _lair_.”

-  
-

The lair turned out to be the rarely-used room under the stage, which was nothing but storage that hadn’t even been touched in probably a decade. The popular boys had shoved the small amount of storage to the walls and decked out the place with old blankets (on the floors and the walls), bean bags, posters and a mini fridge. It actually looked rather cozy for something set up by obnoxious people who usually cause trouble. The teachers didn’t even go in that room anymore, but the fact that they hadn’t been caught was rather surprising.

The jock guy forcefully pushed Ink into the middle of the room, down to his hands and knees. A large office chair was on the far side of the small room. Ink heaved a sigh as the chair spun around, revealing the leader of the popular boys. All of the cronies in the room straightened up, standing like soldiers in front of their king.

Error.

“Well, well, well,” he said, mocking the cliché. “If it isn’t my good buddy Ink!”

“We hardly know each other,” Ink grumbled, getting to his feet. One of the cronies kicked him back down.

“RESPECT THE LEADER!” he shouted.

“Screw you! I only bow to the worthy!”

“I always found your sass intriguing,” Error stated, crossing his legs. “I never would have expected it from your _type_. Out, my minions. I have something private to discuss with Ink.”

Error’s cronies obeyed and exited the room single file without question. Ink rose to his feet, scowling at the boy in the chair front of him.

“What do you want, _Error_?” Ink spat out his name.

“You're not what you let on,” Error answered, getting straight to the point. “I always thought you were just a nerdy little artist with no friends, but there’s just something _weird_ about you.”

Ink crossed his arms, looking bored. “Really. What are you gonna do about it?”

Error rose from his spinning throne. “I don’t know about you…” He walked up to Ink, but didn’t stop, making the artist back up until he hit a wall and they were inches apart. “But I HATE not knowing things.”

“What are you going on about?” Ink asked. “You just suddenly decided that I’m weird and so you’re going to interrogate me until I admit that I’m a fricking superhero?”

“When I get a feeling about something, I’m usually _right_ ,” Error told him. “Of course, I don’t usually get bizarre feelings about things, but since this is the one time that it’s happened, you must have something to admit.”

Ink let out a laugh. “Oh, maybe I’m just gay or something. Wouldn’t that be great for you to know.” He poked Error’s nose, and the other boy instantly leapt back like six feet.

“DON’T TOUCH ME,” Error hissed like a cat. He quickly shook his head, trying to regain his composure. “ANYWAY, there’s no way that’s what it is, because you, that loner artist _freak_ , is talking to me like an old pal. I practically _rule_ this school, and you’ll be having one hell of a bad time if you mess up.”

“Sorry man, I might be a loser in a stereotype’s eyes, but people like you just don’t scare me that much. By the way, cozy place you got here. I was expecting something more… I dunno, badly decorated.”

“You’re DEFINITELY hiding something. I know it, _Isaac_ ,” Error declared.

“Oh wow, must be really important if you’re using my actual name, Mr. _Edward_ ,” Ink replied.

Error was actually the one who gave him the nickname ‘Ink’, and soon enough, everyone in the school was calling him that. But that was pretty much the extent of their association. Where the nickname ‘Error’ came from was a total mystery to Ink, but he called him that anyway because everyone else was.

“IT IS IMPORTANT. I guessed that EJ was hiding brownies in his locker. That John has a group of girls that follow him around when he’s not at school. That Blueberry has a big house in his backyard filled with animals that he feeds tacos to every day. THAT FRESH IS EVIL AND PLANNED TO STEAL MY PLACE AS SCHOOL KING. I was right for all of these without a BIT OF PROOF. And now, this gut feeling of mine is telling me that you’re on an even higher level than these guys.”

“Really? All right then, seems like you knew what was going on with those other people. What do you think is going on with me? Take a guess.”

“YOU HAVE SUPERNATURAL POWERS!”

Ink snickered. “Pfft! You really do want me to admit that I’m a superhero!”

“Not _exactly_ ,” Error snapped. “But I know someone like that when I see one. I can tell. Because I’m just the same!”

Ink raised an eyebrow. “You’re gay?”

“WE’RE _NOT_ TALKING ABOUT THAT.” Error grabbed the collar of Ink’s shirt and slammed him back into the wall. “Stop screwing around! I’m being damn serious!”

“How the heck do you expect me to take you seriously?” Ink asked. “You’re spouting nonsense about superpowers. Seen your therapist lately?”

“I don’t HAVE a therapist, because I’m NOT CRAZY! You know how I can tell? You know I can _tell_ , Ink?” Error backed off. He raised one of his hands towards the ceiling. “I can tell if there’s something WRONG WITH SOMEONE.”

In an instant, bright blue strings shot from his fingertips, spreading throughout the room.

“Including _myself_.”

He swung his arm down, and the mess of strings zoomed back into it.

Ink stood there for a few long seconds, appearing to be taking in what had just happened--

\--but then he grinned, getting a confused look from Error.

“… So it’s true, then,” Ink said. “There is someone else in this school who’s not quite normal.”

Error furrowed his brow, saying nothing.

Ink chuckled. “Well, I suppose I have to admit that you’re strange intuition was correct, then. How bizarre… I wonder if it has meaning, or if you just got lucky.” 

He slowly pulled his sketchbook from his bag and a pencil along with it.

“I do have a power of my own.”

Error watched intently as Ink drew a flower on a blank page. The artist raised his hand in front of it, and it rose from the paper in its two-dimensional state. With a snap of his fingers, it turned into a real flower and fell into his hand.

“I assume we’re trusting each other with our secrets?” Ink asked, taking steps towards Error. “Because if that wasn’t true… Well, let’s just say it won’t be easy for either of us, pal.”

With a smile, Ink tucked the flower over Error’s ear and walked out the door.

Error was speechless.

“ _What… the hell_?”

He pulled the flower out of his hair and stared at it in his hand.

“ _… That guy’s even weirder than I thought_.”


	2. Enter Chris Jackson

For the next decent period of time, Ink was surprised to find that none of Error’s cronies were bothering him anymore. Even Error seemed to be avoiding him, going as far as to avoid eye contact if they were in the same room.

While Ink was a bit relieved that he wouldn’t have annoying unintelligent jocks interfering with his day anymore, he was curious as to why Error would just leave him alone after that, especially after finding out that there is another person in the school with odd abilities.

Was it an unspoken element of their exchange? That Error would finally start minding his own business?

… Well, until one day.

“Dude, what the hell, stop slamming me into walls,” Ink said flatly.

“I need to talk to you about something,” Error told him quietly.

“What? You finally want to confess your love?”

“NO. SHUT UP.”

Before anyone could notice, Error grabbed the hood of Ink’s jacket and dragged him into the janitor’s closet that happened to be nearby and unlocked.

“Look buddy, I have a request,” Error said. “And if you don’t comply, then I’ll just send my minions after you again. And wouldn’t that be _awful_.”

“Depends on the request,” Ink replied. “And you better explain fast, otherwise I’ll have more time to make jokes about you liking me.”

“Just _listen_ to me. You know that new guy? That transfer student?” Error asked.

“You mean Chris? Yeah, we’re like best friends already.”

“Are you serious? I thought were an antisocial artist nerd.”

“Correction: asocial. They’re different things. Anyway, _yeah_ , I know that guy. Why? You getting weird ‘vibes’ from him?”

“Don’t even say that word, it reminds me of Fresh,” Error said. “And yeah. There’s definitely something up with him. And not just in the sense that he has a possible taco addiction--that’s beside the point.”

“You have any specifics? Or is this just another unidentifiable spontaneous hunch?” Ink asked.

“On top of me having one of my always-correct hunches,” Error continued, “that guy talks to himself like he’s talking to someone else.”

“Yeah, and? I do that all the time.”

“No! It’s like he’s having a legitimate two-way conversation! He even said a name! See, I could pass this off as him just being a freak who never outgrew his imaginary friend, but one day I remember he passed by a MIRROR AND I SWEAR THERE WAS A SILHOUETTE FLOATING NEXT TO HIM!”

Ink sighed. “What’s the point of being in a closet if you’re going to yell loud enough for everyone to hear you outside?”

“I’M NOT KIDDING. You’re the one who said you spend time around him a lot! How can you not notice this?!”

“You sure you weren’t tripping?”

“I don’t do drugs, man! And there’s no way it was some mistake, it was a clear silhouette of a little kid with emo hair! That guy’s got a fricking ghost following him around!”

Ink put a hand on Error’s shoulder. “Okay. Slow down. Why are you coming to me about this?”

“Do you know how it feels to finally have someone you can talk about obvious supernatural events with?” Error asked. “My cronies wouldn’t believe me even if I told them, it would probably mess up my reputation as school king, and even if they did believe me, they’d be too stupid to even comprehend it properly.”

“Well, if Chris does end up being involved with the supernatural, I would certainly prefer to talk to him about this than you,” Ink commented. “So maybe I’ll look into it.”

“Yeah, obviously--wait WHAT? RUDE,” Error snapped.

“And with that, I take my leave, Your Majesty,” Ink said, bowing. “I have a class to get to.” He walked out.

Error growled audibly, clearly frustrated with Ink’s attitude.

-  
-

Later…

“Hey Chris, can I ask you a question?” Ink asked.

Chris looked up from his meal. “Sure man, what is it?”

“Do you have a ghost following you around?”

Chris choked on his taco.

“Oh god, are you okay?”

“… I-I’m fine,” Chris answered, coughing. “Where did you get that notion?”

“Uh, well…” Ink started. “You kinda, uh… there’s a silhouette that appears next to you when you’re in front of a mirror sometimes… apparently.”

It wasn’t like Ink was the one who saw it. He seriously hoped that Error really wasn’t seeing things from lack of sleep or something.

“Maybe my question wasn’t phrased correctly,” Ink said. “Are you _aware_ that there might be a ghost following you around?”

“Well… hmm,” Chris began awkwardly, “I uh… didn’t know anyone else could ever see him.”

Ink resisted the desire to headdesk because Error was right again. Though, it would have been incredibly awkward if Error was wrong, so maybe it was for the best.

“It’s kind of a complicated story that I would rather not get into,” Chris said.

“Don’t worry, you don’t have to explain it, I was just… wondering, I guess,” Ink told him. “I won’t tell anyone.”

“It’s all right, I don’t really care. It’s just easier to not tell people, y’know? Like, who would actually believe that. That being said, I really wasn’t expecting anyone to notice, especially in the sense that you saw him and didn’t catch me talking to him or something.”

“Uh… yeah…” Ink trailed off, contemplating telling Chris the whole truth.

That was probably for another time.

-  
-

After school, Ink found himself immediately being pulled into the same janitor’s closet from earlier the moment he walked by it.

“What the--? How long were you waiting in here?!” Ink yelled at Error.

“That’s irrelevant! I assume you completed the mission I assigned you?” the other boy asked impatiently.

“You didn’t assign me any fricking mission,” Ink shot back. “And even if you did, I probably would’ve not done it on purpose.”

 “Whatever! Did you talk to Cross or what?”

“His name is _Chris_.”

“Chris-Cross it is. Now answer my question.”

Ink groaned. “Yeah. No duh I talked to him. We’re _friends_ , we talk to each other. What’s your point?”

“You know what I mean! Did you ask him about the ghost thing?!”

“What does that have to do with you? I’ll tell you if you pay me ten bucks.”

Error grabbed the front of Ink’s shirt and forced him to the wall. “You’ll _tell me_ if I threaten to punch you in the face,” he said threateningly, holding up his other hand in a fist.

“And you won’t do that if I threaten to tell everyone that you’ve been dragging me into closets for _who knows what reason_ ,” Ink replied, teasing the last words, but still sounding irritated. “Now fork over the cash or no information for you.”

“I don’t PAY PEOPLE for information, I’m the KING,” Error hissed. “You seem to be forgetting that whole thing about my minions leaving you alone. If you want to stay on my good side, you’ll answer my incredibly simple question.”

“Buddy, if we’re talking about good sides here, you’re long off mine,” Ink told him. “Also, Chris is an experienced martial artist, so even if you guys try to come after me, it won’t be as easy as it was a number of weeks ago.”

Error scoffed. “Oh. So you’re just going to hide behind your new little friend now,” he said. “It’s too bad he can’t hear you _now_ , freak.”

He held Ink tighter and pushed him harder against the wall.

“I’ll give you five seconds,” Error said darkly.

Ink growled and started scratching hard at Error’s hand and arm with his nails that were longer than they were supposed to be. The taller boy immediately dropped him response, rubbing his attacked hand.

“OW! What the heck?!” Error yelled. “Who does that?!”

Ink smacked him across the head with his hardcover sketchbook before promptly running out the door. Error shook his head, trying to ignore the splitting pain that Ink had just caused him.

“Hey! You frickin’ bastard! Get back here!” Error yelled, jumping out of the closet. “You think you can just run away?! COME BACK HERE AND FIGHT ME!!”

Ink was already out of sight.

“You think this is over?! This is far from over! Tomorrow I’m gonna--”

“IT’S FRIDAY!” Error heard Ink yell off in a distance.

“WHATEVER! THIS ISN’T OVER, ISAAC! BAD TIMES WILL BE HAD!!”

-  
-

Ink spent the weekend visualizing scenarios that could happen the next Monday and how he was going to respond to them.

He knew he wasn’t scared of Error in the slightest, but getting cornered by all of his unintelligent lackeys was unfortunately a possibility. The fact that they were stupid just meant they were more likely to immediately turn to violence and probably wouldn’t listen to reason.

He ended up calling up Chris about it.

“Yeah, so uh, I think Error is going to send his minions after me tomorrow,” Ink said.

“… Error?” Chris asked, sounding puzzled.

“I mean, uh… Edward Quinton. The so-called ‘school king’. Everyone calls him Error for some reason.”

“That’s… strange,” Chris replied. “Anyway, he’s going to send his _minions_ after you? Like his unintelligent gang that popular people always have? Why?”

“Because I refused to tell him something completely trivial and unrelated to him. That guy just never liked me. Either that or he _really_ likes me.”

“Pft. Careful, I might start shipping you two,” Chris said with a laugh, and Ink snickered in response.

“… But in all honesty that guy tried to punch me in the face the last time I saw him so you probably shouldn’t do that yet,” Ink told him.

“What?” Ink heard a significant change in Chris’s tone of voice. “Are you okay, man?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Ink said. “But I don’t know how fine I’ll end up being on Monday.”

“I mean… I would try to stick by you as long as I can, but… that’s obviously not possible for the entire day… Do you have anyone else you can ask to walk around with at different times of the day? I don’t think they’ll bother you as long as you’re with someone.”

Ink let out a doubtful sigh. “I don’t think it’s that simple. He’ll probably kidnap me into a room if he has to. Though… there’s not much that can be done about that.”

Chris coughed. “You _could_ just tell him what he wants to know,” he said a bit harshly. “It seems practical.” He stopped. “N-No, I mean, if you don’t want to do that, there has to be another way out of it. You shouldn’t just give in.” 

“… Chris?” Ink began. “I’m getting mixed messages here.” 

“I… I think that if it’s something you don’t think he needs to know, you shouldn’t tell him. It’s none of his business. Sorry about that. I’ll stay with you as long as I can tomorrow. I have to go now, see you then.”

He abruptly hung up.

“Uh… bye…” Ink said. “ _That was odd_ …”

-  
-

The next day, Chris met Ink at the entrance.

“Chris? Why are you wearing sunglasses?” Ink asked. “It’s not even that sunny.”

Chris looked around as if he was making sure no one was paying attention, raising Ink to confusion and concern.

“Isaac, don’t tell anyone, but there’s… there’s something up with my eye,” he said quietly.

He lifted the shades, and his right eye had turned from its regular grey to an unnerving blood red.

“Dude, what the hell happened?” Ink asked him, a bit shocked.

“I-I don’t know,” Chris answered. “Normally that just happens when Charlie is trying to control me but it usually wears off really fast but this time it didn’t and I’m kind of panicking.”

“… Charlie? Is that the ghost’s name? That thing tries to control you?”

Chris suddenly hunched forward, putting his hand on his forehead. “I’m **not… a thing** ,” he said, almost growling. He quickly shook his head. “Shoot, this is bad.”

“We need to figure out some way to get rid of him! Why haven’t you done anything?”

Chris put the sunglasses back on. “I _can’t_ ,” he said. “I brought this on myself. It’s a long story. I just need to hold him back, and I’ll figure this out on my own. You don’t need to get involved. Right now… I’m just here to make sure Edward and his ‘minions’ don’t give you trouble.” 

-  
-

Ink was cautious for a while. But a few classes passed, and nothing seemed to happen, even after Chris was separated from him. Error’s cronies still weren’t showing up. It was becoming rather disconcerting.

Suddenly, though, on his way to the art room for free period, he stopped.

Just a little ways down the hall was that dang janitor’s closet.

The stupid art room was on the other side of it.

“… _Are you kidding me right now_?” Ink thought.

He groaned and walked over to the furthest side of the hall from it, just in case Error happened to be waiting in there to catch him. He would. It wasn’t a small possibility; Ink would not have been surprised if Error was literally waiting in that closet for at least an hour.

Someone walked by him as he passed the closet, and the instant the person was a decent distance past him, blue strings shot out of the closet and wrapped around Ink after he had already passed the door.

“WHAT THE--” Ink started before he was yanked into the closet.

The person turned around and no one was there. Confused, they continued on with their day.

On the other side of the door, Error had his hand over the tied-up Ink’s mouth and was standing way too close for comfort.

“If you yell right now, I’ll get found out, and I’ll be dragging you down with me,” he threatened. “Understand?”

Ink nodded quickly, trying to calm his adrenaline. He’d almost forgotten what Error’s powers were. With the information coming back to him, what had just happened made a lot more sense and he was able to compose himself. Error took his hand away from Ink’s mouth before wiping it off on his jacket.

“Really, Error? The closet _again_?” Ink asked disbelievingly.

“I picked this closet for a reason, freak,” Error snapped. “It has a secret passageway to my lair.”

“What? There are fricking secret passageways in this school? Who the heck would make a path from the janitor’s closet to under the stage?”

“The previous school king. Anyway, that’s beside the point. We have business to attend to.”

He grabbed Ink’s arm and pulled on an inconspicuous handle attached to the back wall. The wall slid to the side, revealing a dark passage.

“… Damn. How many people know this is here?” Ink asked.

“Me, my most trusted cronies and probably the janitor,” Error answered, forcefully pulling Ink through the doorway and closing the wall behind them. He flipped a switch and a small number of exposed lights lit the way down the unfinished hall. “That’s all I know about.”

Seeing no way to easily escape, Ink just walked along as Error pulled him so it would stop hurting his shoulder so much. He recalled Chris talking to him about a method for escaping this sort of hold, but even if he did manage to get away (which he did not see as likely), the wall needed to be pulled open again which would take too much time.

These awkward quiet moments gave Ink a chance to think about what was really happening right then. He, truthfully, was beyond perplexed by Error’s behavior and couldn’t tell what the school king was trying to achieve. Was this all motivated by his interest in the supernatural and he was implementing his regular obnoxious self into it? Maybe.

He found himself wondering why it’s always the obnoxious people that are popular. Why couldn’t nice people be popular for once? At least that would make logical sense.

Ink’s eyes trailed down to Error’s hand that was tightly gripping his forearm.

Maybe he could break away and sprint for the other door…

But was it really worth it? What if Error wasn’t actually going to have his minions waiting at their lair to beat Ink up? Well… that was probably wishful thinking, but it was still possible.

“ _I’ve been through worse_ ,” Ink thought.

He tried to recall the layout of the room and formulated several escape routes in case that ended up being what happened.

“We’re here,” Error said, pulling the wall open.

Ink held his breath as they entered the room, but then was surprised to see that there was no one else in there…

… except for Chris? 

“Oh there you guys are,” he said, putting what was definitely a Gameboy into his hoodie pocket and standing from the beanbag chair he was seated on.

Ink looked at Error, incredibly confused.

“Look, I thought about everything,” Error told him. “Although I seriously wanted to get revenge on you for smacking me in the head with a book, long story short, I decided against it and I’m doing this instead.”

“… Uh-huh,” Ink answered, actually a bit relieved. He turned his attention back to Chris. “Dude… don’t you have a class right now?”

“Yep,” Chris replied, still smiling. “Anyway, were we gonna talk about something?”

“Indeed,” Error said, walking to the center of the room. “Cross, you’ve been summoned before the king this day to reveal your obvious connection to the supernatural.”

“Why do you keep calling me Cross?” Chris asked, sighing.

“Oh right, it was Chris-Cross, wasn’t it, Ink?” Error remembered. He stopped. “Eh. Cross is easier to say.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Ink grumbled.

“Anyway, Cross! You have an obvious connection to the supernatural and now you’re here to explain it in detail so it doesn’t bother me anymore!”

“I have an obnoxious ghost companion who talks like an angsty thirteen year-old and keeps trying to take over my body,” Chris said. “But how is it obvious? You’re the only people who’ve ever noticed.”

“Error thinks he has the ability to sense the supernatural or some crap like that,” Ink replied bluntly. “And I somehow ended up getting dragged into this.”

“I _do_ have the ability to sense the supernatural and you know it,” Error insisted. “That’s just a component of my ability to be able to recognize things that people are involved with and not talking about. And when it’s a supernatural thing, there’s a very _specific_ way that it makes me feel--”

Ink started looking around the room to find something to distract himself from Error’s monologuing. He soon noticed a small, withered flower sitting on a nearby table. It looked like it had been dried.

It also looked a bit familiar…

Ink remembered what he had done to demonstrate his powers to Error.

“ _Seriously? He kept it_?” Ink thought. “ _It’s just a flower…_ ” He let out a short, quiet laugh. “ _That guy is totally obsessed with me_.”

“Are you listening?” Error asked impatiently.

“Of course not,” Ink replied.

Error’s eye twitched, glaring like he was plotting revenge for later. Again.

“Whatever,” Error grumbled under his breath. “That’s not the point, anyway. Cross, having a connection to the supernatural, I grant you special permission to join my newly formed undercover supernatural investigation club.”

“The hell? Is that what this is?” Ink asked. “And why are you being so nice to him about it?” Error opened his mouth to respond, but Ink kept talking. “No. No wait, I know what this is. I bet you’re fricking scared--”

“Shut _up_ ,” Error cut him off. “I was talking.”

“He kinda was,” Chris said. “So uh. What was this about a club?”

“It’s a supernatural investigation club,” Error repeated. “And undercover, meaning that nobody else knows about it or is to know about it unless the person telling them is ordered to inform them. It’s a secret organization.” He talked about it like he was incredibly proud of the concept. “All of the members have supernatural connections.”

Chris looked genuinely surprised. “What? No way.”

Ink did not look amused.

“You heard that, Ink? Show him what you can do,” Error said harshly.

“‘Scuse me?” Ink responded, furrowing his brow. “If you’re gonna ask me to do something, don’t call me that stupid name, jackass. And say please.”

“Um? What? Which one of us is in charge here?” Error asked, taking a step towards him.

“Why, me, of course,” Ink answered. “Or if not, I may at least mention that the likeliness of you having any sort of control right now is about as likely as that.”

Error growled like an angry nerd. “You’re unfrickingbelieveable!”

“Wow, you guys must really hate each other,” Chris stated. “ **This is hilarious.** ” He quickly shook his head.

“Cross, can you even believe this guy? How can you tolerate him?” Error asked.

“Oh. OH. This is about _me_ now?” Ink demanded, storming the remaining distance up to Error. “You think you can just go ahead and drag Chris into this like he’s _your_ friend? You’re the one who treats everyone else however you want and blackmails people into doing whatever you want by telling them you won’t send your MINIONS AFTER THEM TO MAKE THEM MISERABLE, you condescending asshole!”

“Isaac, stop,” Chris said firmly, pulling Ink away from Error, who was taken aback and unable to find words.

“I’M RIGHT!” Ink shouted. “I’M RIGHT AND YOU KNOW IT, EDWARD! I DON’T WANT TO HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH YOU ANYMORE, YOU GOT IT?!”

Ink broke free of Chris’s grip and ran back to the still-open passageway they had taken to get there.

“ISAAC--” Error yelled, about to go after him.

“Just let him go,” Chris said.

Error turned angrily. “Why?! We’re not finished here!”

Chris gave a short laugh. “There’s no way that guy’s gonna listen to you any time soon. No point in wasting your breath.”

“That ungrateful bastard just said all that _knowing_ I decided to let him go from last time! You think I’m just going to let this slide by? Well I respond to that with a HELL NAW!” He turned back towards the passageway. “ISAAC! GET BACK HERE!”

He sprinted down the corridor.


	3. Temper Problems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie was there too.

Ink accidentally slammed the door behind him when he reached the art room. Thankfully, the room was empty as it usually was. It would have been incredibly inconvenient if it had been that day of all days for it to be occupied.  
  
He knew Error was chasing him. Maybe stopping at the art room wasn’t the best idea, but there wasn’t anything else he could do. School wasn’t over. He only had a moment to be glad that there were no teachers in the halls to get in the way before Error barged into the room.  
  
Why it was good that there was no one to potentially interrupt and save him from this, he wasn’t really sure…  
  
… Perhaps he was bored?  
  
“What’s… What’s the matter, Ink?” Error asked between breaths, locking the door behind him, because that happened to be possible. “Tired of running already?”  
  
“You sound like you’re the one having that problem,” Ink replied. “So what’re you gonna do now? Are you going to beat me up for being right? For finally calling you out on what you are?”  
  
“I’ve…” Error began, still trying to catch his breath as he stormed toward Ink. “I’ve been _patient_ with you, and this is how you treat me in return?”  
  
“Are you kidding? That’s a load of bullcrap,” Ink spat, clenching his fists. “You’ve done nothing but _threaten_ me. And that’s just what you’ve done personally, your dumb minions have been pushing me around since I started high school!”  
  
“You think I told them to attack you personally?” Error asked. “They might do whatever I ask but that doesn’t mean everything they do was ordered by me!”  
  
“That’s not what it looks like…” Ink muttered under his breath. “But even so, that’s not relevant. I’m not going to just forget about you blackmailing me and threatening me on more than one occasion! I told you to get out of my life, so shove off!”  
  
Error stopped.  
  
“… Fine,” he said darkly. “I tried to play nice, but I’m getting sick of you, too.”  
  
“Play nice? Is this some kind of jo–” Ink started, but stopped, seeing what was coming towards him. He dove out of the way, Error’s strings catching a table behind him instead. “Are you insane?!”  
  
Error growled, pulling the table over simply out of frustration. “Fight me,” he declared. “If you can beat me, then I’ll leave you alone. How’s that?”  
  
Ink would’ve had second thoughts about fighting in his favorite room in the school, but he was so irritated that he agreed. “Fine then,” he replied. “I’ll make you regret ever thinking you were _better_ than me.”  
  
He was somehow simultaneously fascinated. It was like a scene out of a book or an anime; two teens with abnormal powers facing off in school…  
  
There was no way it was going to end well.  
  
The doorknob of the room rattled, unable to be opened. “Guys! No!” Chris yelled from the other side. “What the hell are you thinking?!”  
  
Ink smiled, raising his arms. “You could’ve picked a better place, Edward,” he said.  
  
A black substance zipped from multiple places throughout the room and spiraled around Ink. It connected together into a long chain, wrapping around Ink’s left arm and hovering above both his hands.  
  
“This is the _art room_ , after all.”  
  
“What does it matter?” Error asked. “I don’t need to rely on the presence of anything!”  
  
Error immediately fired strings at Ink, who leapt out of the way again. The strings caught on a cabinet, and growling loudly in frustration, Error pulled the whole thing over and the contents spilled all over the floor. There was no reason for him to be creating a huge mess, but he seemed to be doing it anyway because he felt like it.  
  
“Damn it, damn it!” Chris cursed, pulling on the handle of the door like that was going to do something. “You guys are idiots!”  
  
He looked back and forth through the hallways, and there was still no one coming.  
  
“ **Make your choice**.”  
  
What would be harder to explain? Isaac–no, either of them getting badly injured and how it happened, or why the door is in four pieces?  
  
The latter sounded easier to escape from.  
  
Chris held his hand out and a huge, knife-shaped sword materialized into it. He quickly slashed twice at the door, cutting it into four clean segments. After the pieces had fallen to the ground, their edges glowed red where the sword had cut them.  
  
Ink and Error froze in place, staring at Chris. Both of their gazes trailed down to the sword he was wielding.  
  
“Uh… we’ll talk about this later,” he told them, the sword vanishing from his hand. “This isn’t about _me_ , this is about how stupid you two are acting right now! Come on, we’re getting out of here, NOW!”  
  
He stormed over to them and pulled them both towards the door by their jackets.  
  
“Hey! We’re settling a score, here!” Error said, fighting roughly.  
  
“Yeah, save that until you’re caught and kicked out of school,” Chris told him. Error groaned and pried Chris’s hand off his coat.  
  
“I can _walk_ ,” he growled, storming towards the door.  
  
“Don’t just leave, this isn’t going to resolve itself. We’re going back under the stage, and we’re going to talk about this like responsible human beings.”  
  
“Well you know what I think?” Error asked. He walked up to Chris, looming over him slightly. “I think you should mind your own fucking business.”  
  
“Cuz you’re one to talk,” Ink hissed. “All you’ve done is toss yourself into other people’s lives without considering what they think about it.”  
  
“I’m not going to just _sit back_ while my friend gets hurt,” Chris said. “If you’re gonna keep being difficult, fine. We’ll sort it out later. But right now, we’re leaving before someone shows up.”  
  
Chris signaled to Ink, and the two of them ran out of the room.  
  
“Dude, I really don’t want to go back under the stage,” Ink admitted. “I honestly want to go home.”  
  
“Whatever, Edward probably wasn’t planning to go back there anyway,” Chris told him. “But if you disappear right after this room gets destroyed, it just raises suspicions. You’ve gotta stay.”  
  
The footsteps got quieter until Error couldn’t hear them anymore.  
  
“… this is fucking stupid,” he grumbled.  
  
He pushed another bookshelf over for the hell of it.  
  
-  
-  
  
Later, after school, Ink and Chris were walking home together because they lived surprisingly close to each other.  
  
“So, um. About the sword,” Ink started.  
  
Chris just sighed.  
  
“I don’t really get it either,” he admitted. “It has something to do with Charlie. He’s not a regular ghost, he’s some kind of… glitchy hack thing.”  
  
Ink raised an eyebrow.  
  
“Okay, fine, let me just explain from the beginning,” Chris said. “It all started back in middle school…”  
  
“Whoa, flashback time,” Ink stated.  
  
“It was a normal day. Cloudy, the occasional patch of sunlight glowing through and blinding the masses. I was dramatically staring up at the sky, contemplating my pathetic thirteen year-old life. Suddenly, an old enemy approached. Dirk Pesterson. He demanded my lunch money. I said frick you, and he punched me. It sucked.”  
  
Ink listened intently.  
  
“But before more violence could go down, a kid I barely recognized approached. The kid was like, back off, Dirk! And he literally picked up Dirk and slammed him into the ground. I was like, standing there, jaw agape. The kid was like up to my shoulder and Dirk was bigger than me. Dirk ran away crying like a little bitch, and then the kid turned to me. He was like, _hi! My name’s Freddie, I’m a transfer student_!” Chris held a hand up. “Okay, I know it seems like this story is going nowhere, but trust me, it’s making progress.”  
  
“… all right?” Ink responded slowly.  
  
“So like, Freddie got super popular like really fast after that. He looked like such a cinnamon roll that he was surrounded by girls all the time, but because he was also really strong, he commanded the respect of a lot of people. He basically became the school king at my old middle school. It’s a good thing he was a nice and cheerful kid.” Chris trailed off. “At least… that’s what it seemed like.”  
  
“Oh shit,” Ink said for dramatic effect.  
  
The two of them heard thunder nearby, and they started feeling drops of water on their faces.  
  
“That was conveniently placed,” Chris stated.  
  
The drops turned into immediate downpour. The two boys pretty much screamed, taking shelter under a nearby bridge.  
  
“… As I was saying…” Chris started again.  
  
“I can’t hear you, the stupid rain is too loud,” Ink told him.  
  
“AS I WAS SAYING,” Chris said too loudly on purpose before returning to a practical volume, “Freddie seemed like a super nice kid, but one day he approached me, looking kind of sullen. He told me, out of the blue, _Chris, I’m tired of being an only child. It’s so lonely._ I felt really bad for him. Even though he had all these friends, he still felt the way he did. At least I have a younger brother. But then… he said something weird. He said…  _you know, Chris, in another timeline, we were brothers_.”  
  
Ink choked on nothing. “Frickin what?” he asked. “Are you pulling my leg?”  
  
“No, he literally actually said this. _He said, we were brothers. And there was another one. But then, Dad got tired of the way things were. He got bored of US: me and Charlie_.”  
  
“You really remember this word for word, don’t you?”  
  
“I wrote it down. So, I was just standing there, kind of shocked. I was just like, kid, what are you even going on about. Then Freddie just said, _we want things to go back to the way they were._ He told me I was unaware of what was happening. He told me that he actually had half of a power to _bend reality_ , and that my dad had the other half. Our timeline was an experiment.”  
  
“This literally sounds like a dream,” Ink told Chris.  
  
“I'm being dead serious. Do you not believe me?” Chris asked. Ink jumped as Chris summoned the giant red sword again. “Remember, I’m explaining why I have this.”  
  
“… right,” Ink replied as the sword vanished again.  
  
“And then Freddie just said, _we have to convince our dad… YOUR dad… to turn things back to the way they were. And then we will destroy Overwrite._ Which was the ability to change reality. _And the only way we can do that,_ he continued, _is by killing me, his experiment._ So like, Freddie is explaining all of this to me, and in my head I’m just like, dude, I’m thirteen and stupid. Why. I just told the kid, I know you’re like twelve, but you may want to call up a therapist. Then the kid just stopped. He was like, _bro, I’m literally not joking._ This button labeled Overwrite literally materialized behind him. He said, _I don’t like using this ability, but I have to prove this to you._ ”  
  
Ink really wasn’t sure what to think by this point.  
  
“Then, he just turned the falling leaves into various objects right before my eyes. He turned then into snow, into petals, then back into leaves, and I was just like, okay, point taken. So then Freddie was like, _your dad… Xavier… turned me and Charlie into one person. That was his experiment. This is to separate us, Chris. Our death will cause Xavier to realize how wrong this is._ So… Freddie just said… _wait down here. I’m going up to the roof_.”  
  
“What the frick? No,” Ink said.  
  
“I tried to stop him, Isaac. But… I couldn’t. He blocked my entry into the school with his Overwrite power. Before I knew it, he just jumped right off the roof, and… I was just such an emotional mess, I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t move, and then he was just dead in front of me.”  
  
The two of them were quiet.  
  
“But then…” Chris continued on. “While I was frozen in place, overwhelmed with the shock, it was like… something suddenly got into me. I felt this aura of _hatred_ just… appear. And then it _took over me_. And, well… let’s just say… since then, I’ve had to deal with this ghost named Charlie that tries to control me. I’ve had to transfer schools numerous times, half the time because he keeps taking control and making me ruin sh#t. The other half of the time is just because we have to move.”  
  
“Wait, but what about the Overwrite shindig?” Ink asked.  
  
“We’re… working on it. Ever since Freddie died I’ve had the second half of it thanks to Charlie, but it’s mostly dormant and can’t really be used since the circumstances are different than they were with Freddie and Charlie. Sometimes I wonder whether Charlie actually wants to destroy the whole power like Freddie did or if he wants to take it and conquer the world or something like that.”  
  
“But…? How did your dad react to that death?”  
  
Chris remained silent.  
  
“… there are a few things I don’t know,” he said. “He just… acted like he didn’t know the kid. But Charlie’s just like, eff that, he’s being a douche. I don’t even remember when those kids were my brothers, or if they ever were. This is just… what I deal with.”  
  
“Soooo… this has what to do with the sword?” Ink brought up again.  
  
“Oh, the sword is actually the fraction of the overwrite power that I’m able to use.”  
  
“Oh. So that’s why you had to explain all that.”  
  
“It’s a complicated dumpster of shenanigans.”  
  
They sat there in silence, watching the rain for a few minutes. It didn’t seem to be letting up.  
  
“… I never told you what my power is, did I?” Ink asked. Chris shook his head. “I can bring drawings to life, that’s mainly what I can do. Kinda pales in comparison to like… altering reality.”  
  
“Heh. It’s been reduced to a hunk of weightless metal, though,” Chris told him with a laugh.  
  
“HOLY _SHIT_ YOU GUYS,” the two of them suddenly heard. Ink and Chris jumped, turning their heads to the source of the voice. “WHAT THE HELL IS THIS RAIN.”  
  
Error was standing nearby, soaking wet.  
  
“… better question. What the hell do you want?” Ink asked.  
  
Error took a deep breath, then opened his mouth. Then he closed it again. He looked away, put his hand on his face, took another deep breath, and spat out his next sentence fast enough that they could hardly understand him.  
  
“I’MSORRYFORBEINGANASSHOLEOKAY,” he said.  
  
“Can you maybe repeat that a little slower?” Ink asked, a smile on his face, knowing full well what Error just said.  
  
“No. I am literally incapable of repeating that any slower,” Error told him. “I don’t like you very much, and I still want to beat the shit out of you, but yeah. Fiiiiine. I have some problems and I won’t deny it.”  
  
“And it was that fateful day that the self-proclaimed school king realized that he had a superiority complex and that other people had feelings,” Ink said in a dramatic voice.  
  
Error growled. “Shut up or I’ll throw you into the rain.”  
  
“And so they stood there under the bridge, waiting for the rain to let up, and the school king continued to assert his position as a big bad even though it was no use.”  
  
“Then the school king said frick you, go stand in the rain,” Error said, shooting out strings that immediately wrapped around Ink. Error dragged him over to the edge and pushed him outside.  
  
“Oh, no! Rain!” Ink exclaimed sarcastically. “All is lost.”  
  
Chris rolled his eyes.  
  
Before Error could do anything else, Ink turned around, grabbed the strings and pulled Error outside with him.  
  
“DUDE WHY,” Error yelled, withdrawing the strings and jumping back under the bridge. Ink just laughed, standing there and letting the rain hit him.  
  
“Isaac, you should probably get back under the bridge,” Chris told him.  
  
“Nah! It’s fine! I’m too short to get struck by lightning!” Ink announced. “You know, I’m going home! I’m already soaking. My street is only like four blocks away, anyway.”  
  
“But–”  
  
Ink ran off.  
  
“… aaaand he’s gone.”  
  
“That means we can discuss the supernatural investigations club,” Error said.  
  
Chris stood up. “And I’m leaving too.” He darted off into the rain, holding his jacket above his head.  
  
“Hey, are you freaking kidding me?” Error asked. “Oh, come on! You’re really just gonna… uuuugh.” He groaned and slid down the wall to the ground.  
  
He was probably going to have to work on his communication skills before he could get what he wanted this time.


	4. Enter the Jovel Twins

About a week had passed since the rainstorm. It was a normal day at school, well, normal as of late.  
  
At every opportunity where he could without being noticed, Error seemed to be bothering Ink and Chris… or rather, Cross, as literally everyone in the school (plus the narrator) had started calling him, thanks to Error.  
  
He was always trying to talk about the logistics of his newly formed secret investigations club, but Ink was less than interested.  
  
“I propose that we meet on Saturdays,” Error said.  
  
“I propose that you fuck off,” Ink replied.  
  
“Airhorn noises,” Cross stated.  
  
“What the hell, man? Can you stop being so salty all the time?” Error asked, getting fed up with this. “Why are you always trying to test my barely-existent patience?”  
  
“I think it’s obvious. I don’t want to have anything to do with you,” Ink told him.  
  
“What if we have snacks? There’s a mini fridge under the stage for a reason.”  
  
“You can’t bribe me with food.”  
  
“You can bribe me with food,” Cross said.  
  
Error glanced to the left and noticed someone approaching from a distance.  
  
“Oh, frick! Someone’s coming! Act natural!” Error exclaimed. He slammed Ink into the lockers. “I _said_ , give me your lunch money!”  
  
“I don’t have lunch money, you asshat! I make my own food!” Ink retorted.  
  
“Leave him alone, you presumptuous fricker!” Cross said, pushing Error away from Ink.  
  
The person quickly scurried by, wanting to leave the hallway as quickly as possible.  
  
“That worked,” Error said.  
  
“I still hate you,” Ink grumbled.  
  
Error suddenly froze and let go of Ink. He looked over at the running student without moving his head much and furrowed his brow. He stood there silently for a moment, thoughts running through his head.  
  
"… I think I found another one,” he said, not moving an inch.  
  
“Ohhh. Great,” Ink responded sarcastically. “What now?” He stopped. “No, wait. I got an idea. Go bother him instead of me.”  
  
“Hell no, you’re coming with me,” Error told him. “Having a witness makes me seem more convincing.”  
  
“Make Chris do it, just give him food, he’s the one who said that works.”  
  
“Dude–” Cross started, but they kept talking.  
  
“Good point. You’ll probably scare the kid off with your sarcasm anyway,” Error said.  
  
“I have no idea whether or not to laugh at the irony of that statement,” Ink spoke. “You were literally just threatening me and you honestly expect that guy to–”  
  
“And we’re leaving,” Error interrupted him, beginning to speed-walk away. Cross looked at Ink, shrugged nervously, then followed behind the school king.  
  
It wasn’t long until Ink heard Error yelling “HEY! YOU!” way off in a distance. Ink sighed slowly and walked off in another direction, not even wanting to know what cringe this will lead to.  
  
“U-Um, can I help you?” the small student asked. Error and Cross practically towered over the poor kid. He looked like a freshman.  
  
“Sorry about that little show, I have a question for you,” Error said almost too quickly to be understood. “My name is Error Quinton, and I am the school king.”  
  
“I think everyone knows that by now,” Cross stated.  
  
“I am famous for my power of _prediction_ ,” Error continued. He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and momentarily glanced down at it. “It does not function in immediate circumstances, but rather reveals to me the…” He looked back down at the paper. “… state of certain things that are already things.”  
  
Cross looked over at Error and mouthed ‘what’.  
  
The shorter boy raised an eyebrow, having pretty much no idea what was going on. He was expecting a typical school mugging, but perhaps it was not as he had presumed.  
  
“Basically,” Error said, “you’re _different_ , aren’t you?”  
  
“ _I’m gonna regret being here_ ,” Cross thought.  
  
 “Wh… what do you mean?” the student asked. “I-I mean… really…”  
  
“Weird stuff goes on in this school…” Error said ominously. “More than you realize. And I’m here to get to the bottom of it all. But you don’t tell anyone I’m doing that, or else I’ll punch your lights out.”  
  
“Dude, you don’t need to threaten him,” Cross told him.  
  
“It's a habit.”  
  
“I-I’m sorry… I really don’t get what you’re saying,” the student said quietly. “Do you mean like… weird normal stuff… or weird not normal stuff?”  
  
“Weird not normal stuff,” Cross replied. “Like supernatural shenanigans.”  
  
“HEY,” Error said, feeling interrupted because he’s Error.  
  
“Oh… Well, um… I…” the student stuttered.  
  
Before he could say anything else, another boy shoved between them.  
  
“Hey, what the hell is going on here?” he asked. “Leave my brother alone.”  
  
The two boys looked strikingly similar…  
  
“… Are you guys twins?” Cross asked.  
  
“Nice observation. Who cares,” the other boy snapped. “Stop interrogating or pushing around or whatever the frick you’re doing to my brother right now.”  
  
"We were just asking him some questions–”  
  
“Do you know who I am?” Error said, a threatening tone rising in his voice.  
  
“Oh god no…” Cross mumbled, mentally face palming.  
  
“Oh, yeah. I know who you are, all right,” the boy’s twin spat. “You’re the leader of the stereotypical jock bullies. I think my reaction to seeing this situation is only practical.”  
  
“Nev–” the other boy started, but to no avail.  
  
“Come on, Drew, we’re getting _out of here_.” The boy supposedly named Drew was quickly dragged down the hallway by his twin.  
  
Error audibly growled.  
  
“… that could’ve gone better?” Cross said.  
  
“I was _onto something_ ,” Error grumbled. “Who does that little runt think he is?”  
  
“… did you actually just call him a runt?”  
  
Error cracked his knuckles. “That punk is gonna regret this.”  
  
“Ooooorrrrr we can just move on with our lives and not make things worse…”  
  
Error just kinda stormed off, leaving Cross alone.  
  
“ _Maybe I should… go apologize to those guys or something…_ ” Cross thought.  
  
He wasn’t really sure how well it would go, but at the realization that he could suddenly get bunched up with Error’s cronies in anyone’s perspective, he needed to do something.  
  
-  
-  
  
Meanwhile…  
  
“Are you all right? Did they hurt you?”  
  
“Nevin, I’m _fine_ ,” Drew replied almost harshly. “They were just asking me questions.”  
  
“Asking you questions in demanding voices?” Nevin asked.  
  
“No! You walked in and you were being the biggest jerk!”  
  
“Drew, I don’t think you realize who that was. That was the school asshole. The self-proclaimed king. All the bullies in the school _work for him_. The jocks are his minions, and the snobby girls are all in love with him. He’s like the Gaston of Foxfield High but without the excessive muscles.”  
  
“But that was the first time he’s ever talked to me and he wasn’t being that mean! He was just… asking me about… some weird stuff.”  
  
Nevin raised an eyebrow. “Weird stuff?”  
  
“I-I dunno, his friend, or whoever that was, said something about… supernatural things. And the other guy… the ‘king’… he said I was… different.” Drew spoke slowly, trying to get his thoughts out in a coherent order.  
  
Nevin’s eyes widened, and he looked almost concerned.  
  
“Super…natural?” he said.  
  
He let out a nervous laugh.  
  
“Why would he say you’re different? He’s just messing with you. Haha.”  
  
“Nev, are you all right?” Drew asked.  
  
Cross walked over at what seemed like a convenient moment.  
  
“Hey, uh, hi guys,” he started.  
  
Nevin whipped his head around to the source of the voice, immediately shifting his attention. “Oh. It’s you,” he said. “… whoever you are.”  
  
Cross waved. “I’m Chris. Everyone is calling me Cross though thanks to Error. Or. Edward. Geez, this nicknames habituate quickly, don’t they?”  
  
Nevin narrowed his eyes and Drew just kinda stood there, looking uncomfortable.  
  
“And I’m talking too much,” Cross said, sighing. “Sorry about what happened back there, we didn’t mean any harm.”  
  
“Don’t worry, you didn’t do anything wrong,” Drew replied. He glanced over at Nevin, who furrowed his brow.  
  
"At least I didn’t mean any harm. I mean, you’re better off avoiding Error, but sometimes you get caught up in stuff against your will.” He looked over at Nevin. “Oh, and speaking of Error, I think he’s like, plotting revenge on you right now, so… yeah.”  
  
“Figured as much,” Nevin grumbled.  
  
“I'm gonna leave now,” Cross said. He promptly ran off.  
  
"He seems like a nice guy,” Drew stated.  
  
“Why the hell is he wearing sunglasses indoors?” Nevin wondered.  
  
-  
-  
  
Error had apparently engaged loner mode, not returning to bother Ink or Cross for the rest of the day. Ink was relieved, but Cross was rather concerned. They briefly discussed the matter while they were walking down the hall towards the door after school had ended.  
  
“I think he’s planning something,” Cross said.  
  
“He’s always planning something,” Ink replied. “Usually something stupid.”  
  
They stopped, noticing some fiasco going on near the exit.  
  
And of course, Error was involved.  
  
“Oh no,” Cross mumbled. “It’s the angry twin.”  
  
“The what?” Ink asked.  
  
“I’m just saying, you better _stay out of my way_ ,” Error said. “I’m in charge around here and I don’t tolerate this shit.”  
  
“Oh, yeah, whatever, your freaking highness,” Nevin snapped. “Who do you think you are? I can talk however I want. It’s not like I’m being dishonest.”  
  
“I have no idea who that is but he’s got a point,” Ink commented.  
  
Error whipped his head over to look at Ink. “WHEN DID YOU GET THERE,” he demanded.  
  
“Like eight seconds ago.” Ink walked up to the two of them, leaving Cross in the background, totally lost at what to do. Ink looked at Nevin. “Hi. I’m Isaac. I have a feeling we’ll get along rather well in our shared opinion of this narcissist.”  
  
“EXCUSE ME??”  
  
“You’re excused.”  
  
Error growled incoherently, strangling the air with his hands.  
  
“ _DON’T PUNCH HIM. DON’T PUNCH HIM. DON’T PUNCH HIM_ ,” he repeated in his thoughts. “ _CONCEAL DON’T FEEL_ –”  
  
“Why are you restraining yourself?” Nevin asked him. “I thought you were some kind of big bad. Isn’t that what you do?”  
  
“What?” Error asked, face scrunching a bit. “What are you even going on about? Maybe I don’t want to make a scene, dimwit.”  
  
“Ohhh, right. I guess it wasn’t right of me to assume that you were as stupid as you came off to be.”  
  
“All right. I changed my mind.”  
  
Error grabbed Nevin by the front of his shirt, dragged him out the door and threw him down the steps in front of the school. He hit the bottom and rolled a bit on the ground, acquiring several scrapes.  
  
“KNOW YOUR PLACE.”  
  
“Ohhhhh shit, here we go…” Ink muttered.  
  
Cross was standing next to him, looking a bit horrified. He was very close to running out and stopping it from going further, when Nevin rose back to his feet… laughing?  
  
“Why are you laughing, you little freak?” Error asked.  
  
“I should know _my place_ , huh…” Nevin said. He cracked his neck. “My brother told me about what you had talked about. You think he’s different…”  
  
“What does that have to do with anything?”  
  
Nevin looked up at Error. Error’s eyes widened, noticing that Nevin’s eyes had clearly changed from their almost-purple brown to a striking cyan.  
  
“Mess with me all you want, I dare you. But stay the hell away from him,” Nevin said.  
  
“Whoa, man! I wasn’t gonna hurt the kid,” Error told him rather audaciously, walking down the stairs. “You’re the one that fucked up.”  
  
At the worst possible time, Drew walked outside.  
  
“Um, Nev?” he started. Nevin quickly flashed his eyes back to normal, hearing the voice, and stood up. Drew noticed him at the bottom. “Oh, there you are–um, are… you okay?”  
  
Drew looked over at Error, who furrowed his brow.  
  
“Yes, I’m fine, let’s go,” Nevin said, urging his brother along. Drew followed him, pretty much needing to run to keep up. He glanced back at Error when they had gone a decent distance, only for Nevin to take his hand and pull him out of sight.  
  
“He’s interesting, but obnoxious,” Error stated.  
  
“Are you talking about yourself in third person?” Ink asked.  
  
“What? No, I was talking about–”  
  
“I’m not stupid. Of course you were doing that.”  
  
Error stood there, eyes darting about as he wondered how to retort, but Ink walked in front of him and kept talking before he could do that.  
  
“So, what do you pull from this?” Ink asked him. “You just made another enemy who probably has supernatural powers. You’re really bad at this, you know.”  
  
“Hey. Cross believes in me,” Error said, pointing at said person.  
  
“Only half-heartedly,” Cross corrected.  
  
“You know what I’m gonna do?” Ink started again, “I'm gonna talk to those guys tomorrow like a reasonable human being and figure out what’s going on with them. And not tell you. Then, if things go according to plan, I’ll have another buddy or two on my end of the spectrum.”  
  
“Tch, whatever,” Error grumbled, walking off, away from the school. “Anyone coming in contact with you just gets closer to my access automatically. Less work. I’ll worry about this garbage later.”  
  
“See you tomorrow, jackass,” Ink called out, waving him off.  
  
“AU REVOIR, NERD FROM HELL,” Error yelled back.  
  
“IT’S PRONOUNCED _OH REH-VWA_ , NOT _AW REH-VWOR_.” More people had started walking out of the building by then, and a few were glancing over.  
  
Error turned around and put his hands on either side of his mouth. “NERD FROM HELL!!” The two of them were getting more looks by then.  
  
“EGOMANIAC FROM TEXAS!!”  
  
“MEHHHH!!” Error let out a childish cry of irritation and ran off.  
  
Cross and Ink watched as Error practically flew out into the parking lot and into the driver’s seat of a car that looked like a mom van.  
  
“… Hey, dude,” Cross started after a few moments.  
  
“What’s up?” Ink asked.  
  
“Did you see that new Italian ice place that opened up on the way back home?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“We should go there.”  
  
“I don’t have any money on me.”  
  
“I’ll pay.”  
  
“… Cool.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies to those who might live in Texas, just blame Ink.


	5. Noticed

The next day at lunch…  
  
“Dude, we’re going to have to find an alternative to this sunglasses thing,” Ink said. “They’re going to put it on the dress code at some point. It always happens.”  
  
“There is no alternative,” Cross grumbled.  
  
“Maybe you could try growing your hair out and cover it up?”  
  
“I’m not an emo kid. Charlie is an emo kid.” Cross leaned his head on his propped up arm. “Why do people always do that in fictional stuff, anyway? Covering something up with hair is literally the most unreliable way to hide something.”  
  
Ink let out a sigh, picking at the crusts of his sandwich. He glanced up, and noticed Error staring at him from his table of jocks across the room. The school king visibly jolted, then scowled intentionally, knowing that it was too late to look away.  
  
Ink winked at him and Error immediately turned away.  
  
“Why do you do that?” Cross asked. “Wouldn’t you be appalled if anyone thought you two were a thing?”  
  
“I do it because I can,” Ink responded, turning his attention back to his food. “I don’t care what anyone thinks, what matters is what’s actually true.”  
  
“That’s pretty admirable,” Cross said. “I wish I could just… not care about things.”  
  
Ink didn’t respond, and promptly started eating as an excuse to not talk.  
  
"… I’m gonna throw this stuff away,” Cross spoke, almost inaudibly.  
  
He picked up the remnants of his lunch, made his way through the room and threw it in the trash. As he was quickly making his way back, though, he accidentally bumped into someone pushing past him and full on tripped, landing on his hands and knees, his sunglasses hitting the ground.  
  
“Ah, shoot, what even–?” Cross mumbled, grabbing the glasses and turning his head.  
  
Turns out he’d bumped into Nevin of all people.  
  
“Um… Are you…” Nevin started.  
  
He glanced across the room to his twin. Drew gave him a look that clearly read ‘you better be nice’.  
  
“Are you all right…?” he asked awkwardly. He held his hand out.  
  
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Cross replied almost bitterly. He put the sunglasses back on before taking the hand that helped him to his feet.  
  
Cross turned away, not wanting that interaction to last any longer.  
  
Yet, Nevin was standing there, watching him.  
  
“ _Was his eye… red_?” he thought.  
  
He turned away and made his way back to the table in the corner where he and his brother were sitting.  
  
“ _That wasn’t my imagination. It was definitely red._ ”  
  
“Nev? What’s with that look on your face?” Drew asked as his twin sat down in front of him.  
  
“Nothing,” Nevin replied, still lost in thought.  
  
“ _Different, huh._ ”  
  
“ _They weren’t lying…_ ”  
  
-  
-  
  
Later…  
  
“Hey Isaac, I have this sneaking suspicion that I dun goofed,” Cross said.  
  
“What? Why?” Ink asked him. “You think Nevin wants to kill you now because you accidentally walked into him? I mean, he does seem kinda murderous.”  
  
“I didn’t even walk into him! He walked into me!”  
  
“No, you definitely walked into him.”  
  
Cross opened his locker and took some stuff out. “You’re missing the point. See, we’re apparently in Spanish together, and he was staring at me like the entire time from the back of the room.”  
  
“So you think he might have a thing for you?” Ink asked.  
  
“Or he wants to kill me, it’s hard to tell,” Cross replied, shutting the locker.  
  
“Hey, can I talk to you?” a voice next to him suddenly spoke up.  
  
Cross jumped in place. He turned and saw Nevin standing right next to him, right behind where the door of his locker had been.  
  
“Damn, nice jumpscare,” Ink said. He put his hand on Cross’s shoulder. “I think I oughta leave you two alone.”  
  
“B-But–” Cross stammered, but Ink was gone. He sighed and turned around slowly to face the frankly terrifying person on the other side of him.  
  
“I have a few things I need to ask you,” Nevin told him, crossing his arms. Ironic pun not intended. “In _private_ , actually.”  
  
“ _OH GOD, I’M GONNA DIE,_ ” Cross thought. “Heheh, uh, okay?” he answered nervously.  
  
“Maybe we can talk in this convenient janitor’s closet,” Nevin suggested, pointing to a nearby door with a sign on it stating its purpose.  
  
“ _Isn’t the janitor’s closet supposed to be on the other side of the building_?!” Cross thought.  
  
Nevin grabbed one of the straps of Cross’s backpack and practically threw him into the closet. He walked in and closed the door behind him, approaching Cross until the distance between them was uncomfortably small.  
  
“W-What do you want?” Cross asked.  
  
Nevin said nothing, simply reaching up to Cross’s face. Cross was basically frozen in place, not really sure whether the smaller boy planned to strangle him or kiss him. He seriously hoped it wasn’t the latter, but then again, the first one wasn’t so great, either.  
  
While Cross’s thoughts were going a million miles a minute, Nevin simply removed the sunglasses before Cross had a chance to protest.  
  
“… I knew I wasn’t seeing things,” Nevin said.  
  
"… what?” Cross asked, snapping out of his trance. “What the hell, you shoved me in a closet to check out my eyes?”  
  
“You wear these all the time to hide your red eye,” Nevin commented, holding up the sunglasses. “That’s one thing explained. But why the heck is it red to begin with?”  
  
“Hate to say this, but that’s none of your busi…” Cross started, but trailed off.  
  
Nevin was glaring at him with cyan eyes. “I would really like to know,” he said calmly, his tone not matching his expression at all.  
  
“Tell me _why_ you want to know first,” Cross told him.  
  
Nevin let out a forced laugh. “How can I not?” he asked. "I thought maybe I had just come across someone like myself.” He pushed his finger into Cross’s shoulder, who recoiled in reaction to the surprising amount of pain it caused. “You know, you have this very obvious sense of _turmoil_ about you. But it’s not any sense. There’s too much, too much for just one person…”  
  
“OKAY FINE,” Cross said, cutting him off. “There’s a ghost kid mixed into my soul or some shit like that and he tries to control me sometimes and it’s really annoying and my eye turns red sometimes because of him!”  
  
“ _ **That’s one way to put it**_ ,” Charlie grumbled in his head.  
  
“… Is that so,” Nevin responded. “Well, I’m not going to ask how it happened, because frankly, I don’t care. Here’s a real question. Edward Quinton. Does he have any weird powers?”  
  
“Yeah, but he would stab me if I told you,” Cross said. “Whoops. Too late.”  
  
“That’s mildly interesting. So what’s he trying to do, figure out who else is weird?” Nevin asked, giving Cross his sunglasses back.  
  
Cross shrugged. “Basically. You can’t mention anything about me telling you that, though. He’s trying to be all secretive since he doesn’t want to be caught hanging out with nerds.”  
  
“Isn’t that more of a reason to tell everyone? I mean, I get the powers thing, people find out about him, people find out about you. I see that. But what’s wrong with smashing his reputation a little?”  
  
“I think he’s learning,” Cross said. “Also, Isaac said something about, like… anyone spilling anything gets them busted. Like, we turn on Error, he screws us all over by spilling everything.”  
  
“Isaac? That guy who was with you yesterday? So he’s in on this, isn’t he?” Nevin asked.  
  
“Yeah, he actually got involved before I did. He’s got a kind of power of his own, but I’m not really in a position to say what it is.”  
  
Nevin spun around towards the door, putting his hands in his pockets. ”… Tch, what’s even the deal with this? There seems to be some kind of surplus of people with supernatural powers, even with this school being huge.”  
  
“Maybe this town is on a hellmouth,” Cross said with a laugh.  
  
“Nah. Not enough casualties,” Nevin told him.  
  
“HOLY CRAP, YOU GOT THAT,” Cross exclaimed. “This fills me with so much fricking joy.”  
  
Nevin looked back at Cross, raising an eyebrow. “What, hasn’t anyone watched that show?”  
  
“Apparently not! It sucks! And they took it off Netflix too so all our lives are harder!”  
  
“Okay, I’m not here to bond over shared interests. I’m leaving,” Nevin said, walking out the door.  
  
Cross quickly followed, putting his suave shades back on. “Aw come on, man, can you at least tell me–” he started, but when he looked out the door, Nevin had disappeared into the crowd. “… damn, he vanished fast.”  
  
“Boo,” Ink said, standing right next to Cross, who flailed around and yelled some jumbled words in response. “So what’d he want?”  
  
"… Just asking me some stuff about Error,” Cross answered after he had stopped to breathe. “Also, he’s watched Buffy. Ha. Now you need to go watch it.”  
  
“… Really,” Ink mumbled. “Did he ask anything about any of us having weird powers?”  
  
Cross sighed. “Um, sort of, but not a whole lot. I didn’t tell him very much because he’s kinda shady, you know?”  
  
“I dunno, I kinda like him.”  
  
Cross blinked. “Wait, you what?”  
  
“I mean he’s _interesting_ , geez. Besides, you just got dragged into a closet by him, this ship has sailed.”  
  
"Oh frick no, man,” Cross muttered.  
  
Ink nodded earnestly. “Frick yes, man.”  
  
“Oh yeah? Well–I–I ship you with Error.”  
  
“I knew that.”  
  
“… crap.”  
  
As they were walking down the hall, casually chatting, two arms emerged from a nearby open door and pulled them into an empty classroom. The door was slammed shut, and unsurprisingly, there stood Error.  
  
“INFORMATION! GIVE IT!” he demanded. “I SAW THAT!”  
  
“Dude, we’ve been here already,” Ink said. “We aren’t just gonna tell you stuff that doesn’t involve you.”  
  
“If it makes you feel better, we still have no idea what his powers are or anything else about him,” Cross mentioned.  
  
“You guys were clearly having a PRIVATE CONVERSATION,” Error declared. “Why the actual hell would you two be having a private conversation when you don’t even know each other? SUPERNATURAL-RELATED THINGS, I TELL YOU.”  
  
“Yeah, so what if they were?” Ink asked. “You might be the school king, but you’re not the king of supernatural shit. Come back once you’ve earned that title.”  
  
Error let out an extended disgruntled growl, turning around and storming out of the room in the process.  
  
“That was a shorter interaction than I expected,” Ink said.  
  
“He has a class right now,” Cross told him. “And actually, I do too. Catch you later.”  
  
Cross ran out and down the hallway, leaving Ink alone.  
  
“ _… Well, I guess now would be a good time to check and see if they’ve cleaned up the art room yet…_ ” he thought.  
  
-  
-  
  
Ink entered the art room that he and Error had totally destroyed two chapters ago only to see that it was literally in the exact state that it was before, except there was caution tape strewn everywhere.  
  
“What the actual frick?” Ink exclaimed aloud.  
  
“Hey there lil’ art nerd guy,” a grungy voice suddenly said behind him. Ink briskly turned around at the sound.  
  
It was none other than the creepy janitor and his not-so-magnificent beard.  
  
“Bet yer wondering what happened in here, eh?”  
  
“Uh, yeah, what the hell,” Ink replied. “Did someone get murdered in here?”  
  
“Heheh, not yet,” the janitor said.  
  
Pretty much every part of Ink’s brain was screaming at him to hightail the frick out of there.  
  
"… I’m gonna go somewhere else,” he said quickly, speed-walking away.  
  
“Heheheh…” the janitor laughed. “You better watch yerself, laddie. Somethin’ weird is going on ‘round here. A storm is brewin’.”  
  
“ _What is this, Life is Strange_?” Ink thought, not daring to stop in his tracks.  
  
-  
-  
  
The rest of the day passed as normal, at least, that’s what it seemed. Ink and Cross were able to mind their own business, they didn’t get caught up in any more shenanigans with Error, and soon, they were on their way home again.  
  
The two of them were pretty relieved that they hadn’t gotten caught up in some fight between Error and Nevin. In fact, it was quite surprising that it hadn’t happened.  
  
But…  
  
Nobody could have prepared themselves for what was going to happen later that day.  
  
Everything seemed so normal. Ink and Cross were walking home, having a rather heated discussion about the roster of Super Smash Bros, when they heard a distant explosion from the way that they came from.  
  
They both turned their heads and saw smoke rising from what seemed like the school building.  
  
“What… the heck?” Ink said slowly.  
  
Ink’s silenced phone suddenly began vibrating. He pulled it out and saw that the caller ID was “Error Quinton”.  
  
“How the frick did he even get my phone number?” Ink wondered, a bit concerned.  
  
“Dude, just pick it up,” Cross told him. Ink sighed and took the call.  
  
“What the hell did you do?” Ink asked Error.  
  
"It wasn’t me, I _swear_ ,” Error insisted.  
  
“How do you even have my number?”  
  
“Resources. There are more important matters! Someone literally just set off a bomb in the school!”  
  
“And you’re calling me about this why?”  
  
“Be…cause… uh,” Error stammered. “Thought you might know something about it?”  
  
“Why do you even care? What, you think this was caused by some–”  
  
“I WASN’T CALLING TO SEE IF YOU WERE OKAY I WAS CALLING TO BLAME YOU,” Error yelled quickly. It was loud enough that Ink had to hold the phone away from his face.  
  
"… I wasn’t even accusing you of–”  
  
“YOU KNOW WHAT CALLING YOU WAS A BAD IDEA BYE,” Error said, hanging up.  
  
“Yeah, kinda was,” Ink said to himself, immediately blocking the number. He looked at Cross. “Well, we can hope that no one got really injured and that they cancel school for a while, that would be awesome.”  
  
“What if they give us extra work?” Cross asked.  
  
"… Maybe if the person who makes that decision got injured…”  
  
Cross gave Ink a little smack. “The heck, man,” he said, laughing a bit.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Error, I told you it was a bad idea… All it did was make you sound like you were in denial.”  
  
“Denial??” Error asked. “Denial about what, huh Blueberry?”  
  
“You came across as calling him because you were concerned about him,” ‘Blueberry’ replied.  
  
“Hey, buddy. I’m paying you to be helpful, not to tell me things I really don’t want to hear,” Error told him harshly.  
  
“Actually, you’re just paying me for information, a limitation on my freedom of speech was not part of the deal.”  
  
“Well it should be.”  
  
“That’ll be an extra ten dollars.”  
  
Error let out a groan and picked up his backpack that was on the ground near his feet. “Screw this, I’m going home,” he mumbled, walking away. “Why does everyone want me to pay them for everything?”  
  
“Because that’s how the world works, Error,” Blueberry said, shaking his head.  
  
“YOU WEREN’T SUPPOSED TO ANSWER THAT, THAT WAS AN EXPRESSION OF MY PERSONAL STRUGGLES.”  
  
“You know, I like helping people with their personal struggles!” Blueberry called out.  
  
“GOOD FOR YOU!” Error yelled, getting further away.  
  
“WE SHOULD TALK ABOUT THIS SOMETIME.”  
  
“WHY DO I END ALL OF MY WEEKDAYS YELLING AT SOMEONE FROM A LONG DISTANCE?!”  
  
“THAT SEEMS TO BE ANOTHER PROBLEM OF YOURS.”  
  
“LEAVE ME ALONE!!”


	6. Unsaid

They were free. School was cancelled for repairs, claiming that they would be shut down for at least a week, and if it took longer than that, they would start to assign the additional work. It was lucky, really.  
  
Only a portion of the school was damaged, and fortunately not a major portion. It seemed to have come from a bathroom on the highest floor. No evidence of who caused the explosion was discovered, but a rumor had begun to spread within the first day that it was the tenth grade math teacher doing his business.  
  
Ink decided to be a rebellious teenager on day two and invite Cross over to his house while his parents were gone.  
  
"Aw man, this is so exciting,” Cross said, stepping into Ink’s apartment. “I feel like such a sneaky rebel.”  
  
"Welcome to the underwhelming cave,” Ink spoke, holding sarcastic presentational arms out. It was a quaint two-floor apartment that looked just about the right size for his family–him and his parents.  
  
“It’s not underwhelming, you have a really nice place,” Cross told him, taking his shoes off by the door. “Where are your parents, anyway?”  
  
“Just work,” Ink answered with a shrug. “My dad works at Dreamworks and my mom is a psychiatrist. They’re busy all the time.”  
  
“ _ **His mom is a psychiatrist. Ha! The irony**_ **!** ” Charlie laughed, only hearable to Cross. “ _ **He should set HIMSELF up for an appointment, like, do you even see how effed up he is**_ **??** ”  
  
“Your dad works at Dreamworks? That’s sick,” Cross said, following Ink into the kitchen.  
  
“ _ **Yeah, never say that again,**_ ” Charlie declared, but Cross had gotten used to ignoring him.  
  
“I guess it is,” Ink answered. “So, like… got anything in mind?” He pulled some bags of chips out of the cupboards. “We’re set here.”  
  
“… You got any games?” Cross asked.  
  
“I’ve got a Wii and a PS4…” Ink said. “We could play a friendship-ruining competitive game like Mario Party or Brawl. I don’t think I even have any real multiplayer games for the PS4.”  
  
"I am _all_ for that.”  
  
-  
-  
  
Later…  
  
“I have got to stop eating these potato chips,” Cross stated. “Isaac. Take these away from me so I stop eating them.”  
  
Ink gave him a look and confiscated the potato chips. He stood up to put them away, and while he did so, Cross checked his phone.  
  
“Aw, shoot, man,” Cross said as Ink came back in.  
  
“What?” Ink asked, sitting down next to him.  
  
“You know how I’ve been waiting for the inevitable news of someone getting injured from this whole explosion thing?” Cross asked.  
  
“What, did someone get injured?”  
  
“Yeah. Drew Jovel is in the hospital right now–looks like he broke his leg.”  
  
“… Who Jovel?”  
  
Cross showed Ink his phone. There were two pictures on the Facebook post, uploaded by some girl Ink didn’t really know. The caption of the first photo showing Drew in a hospital bed with a cast on and head bandage read, “look at this poor, tortured soul! Give him some love!” and way too many emojis. The caption of the second blurry picture that had Nevin in a portion of it said, “and this is his brother trying to take my phone away.”  
  
“Oh, is that… eh… what’s his name’s brother?” Ink asked. “Scary guy?”  
  
“Nevin,” Cross told him. He turned his phone off. “Dude, we should be decent human beings and visit Drew in the hospital.”  
  
“But then we’d have to buy _flowers_ ,” Ink practically whined.  
  
“Yeah. And that’s how you care about people, Isaac.” Cross stood up. “Fortunately, the local hospital has a flower shop right next to it, so that makes our lives easier.”  
  
“What? We’re going right now?”  
  
“Yep. Good thing I have a car.”  
  
“A car? But you only live like two streets away,” Ink said.  
  
“Yeah. We’re gonna walk back to my house, take the car and _then_ leave.”  
  
Ink groaned.  
  
-  
-  
  
A clip of Ink and Cross listening to All Star in the car with the windows down played to indicate a scene transition.  
  
The two of them walked into the hospital room. Drew smiled when they entered, and Nevin was sitting at his bedside, reading.  
  
“What are you guys doing here?” Nevin asked, sounding kind of salty. Drew shot him a look and Nevin turned away.  
  
“Just, uh… dropping by,” Cross answered. “We heard that there was an injury, and…”  
  
“Thank you,” Drew said, accepting the little bouquet they brought.  
  
“What actually happened?” Ink asked.  
  
Nevin opened his mouth to speak, but Drew started talking before him. “Just… some stuff fell on me when the school blew up. I hope they figure out why that happened.”  
  
“I’m telling you, it was the _king_ ,” Nevin declared.  
  
“Actually, he said it wasn’t him, but who are we believe that,” Ink said. “Honestly, though, I’m placing my bets on the janitor.”  
  
Nevin snorted. “The _janitor_?”  
  
“Have you ever even talked to that guy?” Ink asked him. “He’s shady as hell. And the fact that I accidentally talked to him earlier that day and he was acting even weirder than usual just makes me feel more inclined to accuse him.”  
  
Nevin hummed in response, thinking about it as he turned his attention back to his book.  
  
“Um, hope you get better soon,” Cross told Drew. “When are they letting you out?”  
  
“Tonight,” Drew answered. “I’m gonna have to use crutches though.” He laughed sheepishly.  
  
There was a painfully awkward silence.  
  
“We’re gonna head out now,” Ink said, feeling physically uncomfortable.  
  
“Thank you for the flowers,” Drew spoke.  
  
Ink and Cross left, and the room returned to silence, the only noise being the low hum of the air conditioning and the sound of footsteps outside.  
  
After a few moments, Drew looked over at Nevin, who was occupied with his book.  
  
“… Nev, something occurred to me,” Drew said quietly.  
  
“What?” Nevin asked, not looking up. Drew didn’t immediately respond. “What is it?” Nevin repeated.  
  
“How did you lift all that debris off me by yourself?”  
  
Nevin stopped.  
  
“… I had help, someone showed up,” he said. “And it was adrenaline.”  
  
“Who helped?” Drew asked. “I want to thank them.”  
  
“I don’t remember. I’d never seen him before.” Nevin turned the page of his book. “I already thanked him, so don’t worry about it.”  
Drew gazed back down at his hands in his lap, furrowing his brow.  
  
He could have sworn he saw that Nevin’s eyes were a weird color in his vague memories of the incident, but he decided not to mention it. He may have been seeing things… he had gotten a concussion after all.  
  
However, something that he was certain of was Nevin’s recent odd behavior; he was acting very secretive. Nevin didn’t ever really like talking about himself, or talking much at all, but he lately he had been even quieter than usual, frequently changing subjects or even cutting conversations short.  
  
“Nev… are you okay?” Drew asked.  
  
Nevin scoffed, a look of disbelief on his face. “Why are you asking me? You’re the one in the hospital bed,” he said.  
  
“I just… want to let you know that you can tell me anything,” Drew spoke. “You seem like you’ve got a lot on your mind lately.”  
  
“I always have a lot on my mind.”  
  
“Is someone… giving you trouble?” Drew asked. “Because if they are, please tell me, you can’t do this again–”  
  
“I’m _fine_ ,” Nevin insisted. “I’m just _tired_. Okay?”  
  
“I’m just… worried…” Drew said, trailing off.  
  
The room grew quiet yet again.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Well, I think I just experienced an overdose of awkward,” Ink commented, slouching in the passenger seat of Cross’s car. "We have to negate it with meme music.”  
  
“Like what? I have an entire playlist of meme music,” Cross said, giving Ink his phone that was bluetoothed to the car’s speakers.  
  
“Oh my god, there are so many,” Ink stated, scrolling through it. He laughed to himself, picking We Are Number One the second he saw it.  
  
“Dude, really?” Cross asked, snickering.  
  
“We are the neighborhood memers!” Ink announced, rolling down his window and turning the music up.  
  
Things were great for about the next seven minutes. Then they got back to the small apartment building where Ink lived, and quickly realized something was wrong.  
  
“… that car looks familiar,” Ink stated, pointing to a mom van parked in front of the building. It certainly wasn’t there when they left.  
  
The door of the van dramatically swung open, thankfully not being parked next to another car. A leg stuck out of it, and the person exited the vehicle.  
  
Yep, it was Error.  
  
Ink and Cross hadn’t turned their music off, and the second Error entered their sight, it happened to switch to Never Gonna Give You Up.  
  
Ink just looked at Cross, took off his seatbelt and got right out of the car.  
  
“Why. The hell. Are you here,” he demanded, storming up to Error. “AND HOW.”  
  
“Nice to see you too, shortstack,” Error replied.  
  
“HOW DO YOU KNOW WHERE I LIVE?!”  
  
“That’s not important right now. The fact that I’m here is blatant indication of the more important matters on hand.”  
  
“Or blatant indication that you clearly have nothing better to do with your life!”  
  
Cross did something on his phone and his car’s speaker started to play Guile’s theme. Unfortunately, his clever efforts went unappreciated, as Ink and Error ignored him. Cross let out a sigh of defeat, pulling in to park his car and get it out of the way.  
  
“Can we talk about this in your apartment? It's far too classified to be discussed in a public parking lot,” Error said.  
  
“Because that’s any different from regular classified?” Ink asked as more of a statement. “Yeah, there’s no way I’m letting you in my house.”  
  
“Would you rather talk in the car?” Error suggested, pointing to his mom van.  
  
“No,” Ink replied flatly. “In fact, I would prefer to not talk at all.”  
  
“Why are you so difficult? Can’t we just put our past behind us so resisting my urge to punch you is easier?”  
  
Cross felt the urge to pick up his phone and start recording this conversation.  
  
"Why do you want to talk to me if you hate me?” Ink asked. “You're probably making your own life more difficult by forcing yourself to continue interacting with me!”  
  
“Ink, look, I know you’re trying to get rid of me,” Error said a bit melodramatically. “But I can’t do that. Even though I want to, I can’t just cut you out of my life. Not after everything that’s happened.”  
  
“Really! Because frankly, I think it’d be really easy,” Ink told him. “Also, my neighbors are going to think you’re my ex if you keep talking like that.”  
  
“Oh, shit, that was really corny,” Error stated. “But I just… I wish that we could… I don’t know… try being friends…?” He face palmed. “God dammit. I can’t make this sound fricking normal.”  
  
“No,” Ink said curtly. “I’m not going to be friends with someone who, one, thinks he’s superior to me, two, only gives a shit because of you know what, and three, is trying to maintain two faces rather than just picking _one_. So you know what I’m gonna say, Edward? I’m gonna say come back when you decide that this is more important to you than being the fucking king.”  
  
“Do you know how long it took me to get here? I can’t just give this up!” Error argued.  
  
Ink slowly shook his head. “I didn’t think so.”  
  
He took some steps backwards and looked over at Cross, who quickly put down his phone before Ink could see. Ink signaled for Cross to follow, and he did. They made their way up the stairs to the higher deck where Ink’s front door was as Error stood there in silence, the confused glower on his face following them until they had entered the building.  
  
Error put his head on the side of his car.  
  
“Dammit…!” he cursed.  
  
He got into his car, pulled out his phone and selected a number. It rang for a short while before the dialed person picked up.  
  
“Hello?” the person asked.  
  
“Blueberry, I’m lonely as hell right now,” Error said. “Where are you.”  
  
“Just at home, feeding my animals. Wanna come over?”  
  
“Yes. I need cats right now.”  
  
“You’re in luck. Mellie gave birth to a litter recently and they’re all extremely cute.”  
  
“Cool. See you in a bit.” Error hung up and drove his car out of the parking lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I drew the appearances of some of the characters recently; you can see them in the link below!
> 
> http://onebizarrekai.tumblr.com/post/163105296219/basic-character-appearances-in-ibvs-everyone


	7. Less Than Good Morning

Nevin groggily stared at himself in the bathroom mirror that morning.  
  
It was one of _those_ mornings. One of those mornings where he was questioning his life. Questioning what his life had come to. Questioning why he put so much effort into straightening his emo haircut. Questioning why he’d decided to get out of bed.  
  
Oh, right. He had to make breakfast for Drew since their grandma was out, and Drew was obviously incapacitated, his leg being broken and all.  
  
He grabbed his toothbrush, still staring at his jet black hair with a displeased look. He ran his hand through it and cringed, dear lord, it was so oily that morning. He was going to have to wash the frick out of it when he showered.  
  
Why couldn’t he just have perfectly straight hair like they do in anime? Why did he even put the effort into it? He could just get it cut shorter and embrace his hair’s natural order like certain Youtubers had been doing.  
  
But no. He couldn’t. That feeling of success that he felt every time he had successfully straightened it, and how amazing it looked, it was too much to give up. It was who he was. At least, for the time being.  
  
Nevin turned on the shower while he was brushing his teeth to let the water heat up. After a minute or two, he spat the foam into the sink, a bit lost in thought as he glanced back up at the mirror.  
  
His half-lidded eyes flickered cyan for a moment.  
  
Man, he had dodged that confrontation so smoothly yesterday.  
  
Nevin let out a huff of air.  
  
Okay, it could’ve actually gone better than it did. Now his brother was going to get on his back about him being okay. And the fact that the _stupid school king_ was indeed being a troublesome prick was only going to make things more difficult.  
  
It hadn’t been long since he’d been personally acquainted with Error, but he already wanted to beat the crap out of him. Nevin had never liked Error since he and Drew transferred to Foxfield for their sophomore year, but now he _really_ didn’t like him, especially after the king had thrown him down those freaking stairs, like, holy hell, that hurt.  
  
How did Error even get a position like that? Why was it always the condescending jerks who were gracefully lifted into imaginary thrones like they were entitled to it?  
  
“Hmph… If I was king…” Nevin grumbled to himself as he started undressing for his shower.  
  
The audience thought this was going to be a shower scene, but it was skipped because Nevin was a minor.  
  
After his shower, and after blow-drying and meticulously straightening his hair into as much perfection as he could achieve, he headed downstairs to the kitchen to start mixing up some omelets.  
  
He gasped internally. “ _BACON_ ,” he thought.  
  
And so they became omelets with bacon in them.  
  
As Nevin was cooking them, he heard clanking noises upstairs. Yep, Drew was finally awake, and that was the sound of his crutches.  
  
That sound was going to be useful for knowing where he was.  
  
Nevin hummed in thought, wondering how Drew was supposed to shower with a full leg cast on. Would he need help?  
  
Nevin walked over to the bottom of the stairs. “HEY. DREW.”  
  
“WHAT,” Drew called down.  
  
“HOW DO YOU PLAN TO SHOWER WITH THAT ON?”  
  
“I HAVE AN IDEA. DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT.”  
  
“CAN YOU WAIT UNTIL AFTER BREAKFAST, THOUGH? IT’S ALMOST DONE.”  
  
“OKAY.”  
  
Nevin went back to cooking breakfast, singing a morbid parody of a song that he’d heard in an abridged series.  
  
He almost threw his spatula in the air when he heard the doorbell ring.  
  
Why the hell was the doorbell ringing.  
  
He didn’t recall anyone ordering any packages. And he seriously hoped it wasn’t one of his neighbors complaining about something, or some Jehovah’s Witnesses out at nine in the freaking morning.  
  
Nevin attempted to look through the front door’s blurry glass windows, only able to make out a tall figure with platinum blond hair, wearing a white hoodie and black skinny jeans. He seemed to be wearing sunglasses in spite of the cloudy weather…  
  
“ _Wait a second_ …” Nevin thought, opening the door. “Jackson? The hell are you doing here?” he asked.  
  
“I, uh… live nearby,” Cross told him. “I saw you guys walk in last night. Um… Hi.”  
  
“ _Dammit, it IS a neighbor coming to complain about something_!” Nevin thought, sighing. “Well, what is it?” he inquired.  
  
“Can I… use your kitchen?” Cross asked. He held up a plastic bag with some stuff in it. “My dad started losing it and I didn’t have time to make myself breakfast soo… yeah. I’ll clean up everything I use.”  
  
“… sure, whatever, I guess,” Nevin told him. “Come in.”  
  
Cross walked in and Nevin shut the door behind him. “Sorry… are you making breakfast right now? I’ll wait,” Cross said.  
  
“Why are you asking us? Doesn’t your friend Isaac live minutes away from you?”  
  
Cross followed Nevin into the kitchen. “Well, he… lives in an apartment complex with just his parents…” Cross explained. “I haven’t met them and I don’t know what kind of people they are, especially in the mornings, and…”  
  
“You don’t know who we live with either,” Nevin said, flipping over the two omelets he was simultaneously cooking.  
  
“Fine… This was literally only like two houses away as opposed to several streets and the interiors of our houses are identical so it’s more convenient. Also I forgot Isaac’s apartment number.”  
  
“You aren’t here on some mission from the _king_ , are you?” Nevin asked.  
  
“What? No,” Cross said. “I don’t really do anything for him other than tolerate him.”  
  
“Tolerance can be a pretty big favor when it comes to people like him.”  
  
“That’s not the point, man.”  
  
They heard some clanking upstairs.  
  
“NEVIN CAN YOU HELP ME,” Drew called down. “I DON’T KNOW HOW TO GET DOWN THE STAIRS WITH CRUTCHES.”  
  
Nevin let out a sigh. “A moment, if you will…” he told Cross, putting the two omelets on plates before running to the stairs to help his brother.  
  
A few minutes later, the twins reentered the kitchen.  
  
“Whoa. What’s Chris doing here?” Drew asked.  
  
“He needs to borrow the kitchen to make himself breakfast,” Nevin replied. “Shenanigans at his house.”  
  
Drew sat down at the table and set his crutches against the wall. “You live close to us?”  
  
“Yeah, like two houses away,” Cross told him.  
  
“Ooh. Fun,” Drew said. “We should have meal parties on a regular basis.” He noticed that Cross was still standing up. “You know, you can sit down if you want.”  
  
“It’s fine, I gotta make something anyway. You guys… have a toaster, right?”  
  
“What are you making?”  
  
Cross pulled what he was planning to eat out of the plastic bag he had.  
  
“Are those fricking toaster waffles?” Nevin asked. “You disgrace to breakfast.”  
  
“I was gonna eat poptarts but then I remembered that I ran out yesterday…” Cross said.  
  
“Don’t EVEN,” Nevin declared. “This is _sacrilege_ to breakfastolicism. And I’m atheist.”  
  
“Or breakfastolic, apparently?” Drew asked.  
  
“You know what? Frick yeah. I’m breakfastolic.” Nevin walked over, pulled a chair out and forced Cross to sit in it. “You’re going to sit here, and I’m going to make you something that isn’t grocery store garbage.”  
  
“Oh come on, you don’t have to do that,” Cross told him.  
  
“Yes I do, because otherwise you’ll eat toaster waffles and the mere thought disgusts me!” Nevin held up the carton of eggs and the bacon package. “You aren’t vegan or something, are you?”  
  
“Uh, no.”  
  
“Then you’re in luck, because not many people get to eat my omelets of utter perfection.”  
  
“Nev, you’re gonna offend a vegan one day if you talk like that,” Drew said.  
  
“I offend someone every time I mention that I’m atheist. I kinda stopped caring about offending people overly dedicated to different views a long time ago, because it happens inevitably,” Nevin answered, mixing some eggs up.  
  
“You’re not an atheist anymore, you’re breakfastolic.”  
  
“Not until the baptism happens.”  
  
Cross couldn’t hold back his laughter. “What are breakfastolic baptisms like?” he asked.  
  
Nevin poured the eggs into the frying pan. “It’s like a catholic baptism, but with orange juice.”  
  
“Eww,” Drew said. “Oh yeah. Sort of speaking of which…”  
  
“Speaking of what? Catholics or orange juice?” Nevin asked him.  
  
“I had a dream last night that Grandma made us go to some weird religious meeting. They were talking about how a zombie apocalypse was going to happen and that we needed to be prepared for it, and you were like, you’re kidding, right? And Grandma was like, hush Nevin, have you even been watching the news? And she turned to me all like, you understand, don’t you? And I was just like, uh, yeah. Then, suddenly, Miss Patterson got up on the stand and started talking about the importance of history in our society. Which is weird, because she’s my health teacher.”  
  
“Well, history _is_ important,” Nevin commented. “Without history, everyone would be doomed to make the same mistakes over and over again. Yeah, schools tend to teach it in the most boring possible way, but it’s important.”  
  
“You like history?” Cross asked.  
  
“I’d probably like it more if people knew how to teach it and they weren’t so obsessive about drilling in exact dates that you forget two days after the test.”  
  
“Anything can be interesting with the right teacher,” Drew stated.  
  
Drew and Cross continued chatting as Nevin finished up free breakfast for Cross. They seemed to be having a good time, yet Nevin could only feel a growing uneasiness as he listened to them talk.  
  
Cross was… weird. Nevin couldn’t let him and Drew be friends. One way or another, beans would be spilled. Everything that Nevin was doing would be for naught.  
  
Was it inevitable?  
  
As bizarre as it sounded, he was living the plot of a Frozen derivative. Trying to keep his powers a secret from his brother. Trying to keep _everything like this_ a secret from his brother. And of course, they just so happened to settle in a new neighborhood where this stuff apparently flourished.  
  
He just wanted to keep Drew safe… he didn’t want him involved in any of this.  
  
Nevin finished cooking up the omelet, dropped it on a plate and handed it to Cross with a fork.  
  
“Oh, um… thank you so much,” Cross said.  
  
Then again, Cross and Nevin knew about each other already, and Cross seemed trustworthy. Perhaps Nevin could tell him about the dilemma–it wasn’t so complicated. All things considered, he would have no choice, if Cross continued to be a part of their lives.  
  
“You’re welcome,” Nevin replied, finally sitting down to eat his own food.  
  
-  
-  
  
Error was peacefully sleeping in that morning. He had no desire to get up, and there was no need to. No breakfast to attend, he would be making that himself anyway. Nothing could have possibly ruined that moment of–  
  
“ED ED ED!!” a high-pitched voice shouted in the doorway. Error yelped as he was scared awake, throwing the covers over his head. “Get up already!”  
  
“You can’t tell me what to do!” Error protested.  
  
“Oh yes I can! You promised you’d drive me to Gamestop to get the new game I wanted, and it’s almost ten!” the childish voice declared. The young boy ran over to Error’s bed, shaking him intensely. “They’re going to run out!”  
  
Error’s hand stuck out from the covers and swatted at him. “Geno, chill, they’re not going to run out…”  
  
“Ed!! I want my game really badly!” the boy whined.  
  
Error let out a disgruntled groan into his pillow. “Fine… Just let me get up…” he mumbled. He sat up, rubbing his eye, the sight of his small, eight year-old brother greeting his vision. Error sat there and slowly blinked. “… nope. Never mind. Too tired.” He collapsed back down.  
  
“ED!” Geno yelled. He grabbed Error’s arm and pulled on it.  
  
“Okay okay okay, I’ll get up, stop pulling,” Error grumbled.  
  
Error trudged around the upstairs level of his house for a while, running through boring morning routines as his little brother bounded around impatiently.  
  
“Ed?? What’s taking you so long?!” Geno demanded through the bathroom door.  
  
“Be patient, Geno!” Error answered, right in the middle of spiking his hair. “I’ll be out in like two minutes!”

“You’ve already been in there for ten minutes!”  
  
“You’ll understand when you’re in high school!”  
  
“I’ll understand why you spend so much time in the bathroom?”  
  
“Yes, you will understand.”  
  
“Whatever you say, Edward Von Pretty Boy.”  
  
“I’m not a pretty boy! Do you even know what it means when you call someone a pretty boy?”  
  
“Of course I do, you explained it to me!”  
  
“Will you two pipe down?” a loud voice called from downstairs. “It’s too early to be arguing!”  
  
“WE’RE NOT ARGUING, DAD!” Geno answered.  
  
“Yes you are! It sounds like arguing!”  
  
Error smoothed his hair down one last time. Wait, one more time. There.  
  
“All right kid, let’s go,” Error said, opening up the door.  
  
“Finally!” Geno cheered.  
  
-  
-  
  
Shortly after entering Gamestop a quick drive later, Error stopped in his tracks.  
  
“ _Oh, god. Why_ ,” he thought.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Geno asked.  
  
Error remained silent. “ _WHY IS INK HERE_ ,” his thoughts continued. “ _OF LITERALLY ALL TIMES_.”  
  
The shorter teen across the store noticed him. He raised an eyebrow, before letting out a disgusted sigh and attempting to turn his attention elsewhere. The other people in the store felt an inexplicable chill as some kind of aura of uneasiness filled the room.  
  
“Who’s that?” Geno asked Error, pulling on his hand.  
  
Error didn’t really answer. “Uhh…”  
  
Ink looked back, noticing the young boy in an oversized hoodie holding Error’s hand. Suddenly curious, he made the decision of walking over. He was already standing in front of them by the time he was having second thoughts.  
  
“Well. Fancy seeing you here,” Ink said.  
  
Unable to get answers out of his own brother, Geno looked up at Ink. “Do you and my brother know each other?” he asked.  
  
“You guys are brothers?” Ink questioned, sounding surprised.  
  
“Yeah. I know. We look literally nothing alike,” Error grumbled. This happened every time someone saw them next to each other for the first time–Error’s darker skin tone and Geno’s literal albinism really set them apart. “Also, we’re stepbrothers.”  
  
“Huh, I see,” Ink said. He looked down at Geno. “What’s your name?”  
  
“I’m Geno!” the young boy chirped. “What’s your name, mister?”  
  
“I’m Isaac. Your brother _Edward_ and I go to the same school.” He had a hint of bitterness in his voice that only Error could recognize.  
  
“Are you friends?” Geno asked.  
  
“O-Of course we are!” Error told him. “Haha. Isn’t that right, Isaac.” He gave Ink a light punch in the shoulder.  
  
Ink looked appalled.  
  
“… Yeah. Sure,” he replied. “See you later.” He put his hand on Error’s shoulder as he walked past them to leave. “Your little brother is surprisingly polite,” he said under his breath as he stepped out the door.  
  
Geno made a face. “… Are you sure you guys are friends?” he asked. “He seems kinda…”  
  
“Salty? Yeah. He’s perpetually salty,” Error told him.  
  
“Too many potato chips?”  
  
“… too many potato chips.”


	8. Fear

“And then Nevin started judging me for my breakfast habits,” Cross complained. He was lying on his bed that evening, on the phone with Ink. Fortunately, the condition of his house had relaxed, and he could return, but he really felt no desire to leave his room.  
  
“He’ll make a great future wife,” Ink replied nonchalantly.  
  
Cross sat up abruptly. “WHAT?”  
  
“Er, I dunno. Which one of you is more wifey in general? I don’t know him as well as you do. So like, you thinking him as like an overprotective boyfriend orrr…”  
  
Cross could hear brisk keyboard clicks on Ink’s side of the conversation.  
  
“Are you writing a goddamn fanfiction?” Cross asked.  
  
Ink sniggered. “I’m doing homework, Chris.”  
  
He was definitely writing a fanfiction.  
  
“You’re letting this get to your head. Then again, perhaps that’s for the better, because then it’ll actually happen,” Ink said.  
  
Cross made a face that he knew Ink couldn’t see, but he made it anyway. “Dude. Why.”  
  
Ink rolled his eyes. “Lighten up. I’m just messing with you.”  
  
“Go marry Error, you douche.”  
  
Ink scoffed a bit.  
  
“Onto different matters,” he started, closing his computer and spinning around in his chair. “I’ve been thinking about what exactly happened at the school when it blew up.”  
  
“It was probably some kind of gas leak,” Cross told him.  
  
“But wouldn’t we have heard something by now if that was it? What if it really was intentional?” Ink asked. “Like, can you even imagine that? Imagine if we got to figure out who it was.”  
  
“You’re really bored, aren’t you?”  
  
“God, you have no idea. I almost want to call Error just to occupy myself with something.” Ink paused. “No, wait. That’s a terrible idea. I really don’t want to do that.” He spun in his chair again. “Speaking of Error, did you know that he has a little brother?”  
  
Cross let out a half-hearted laugh. “So there’s a prince, huh?”  
  
“I ran into them earlier today. The kid looked like a third grader. Also, random thought, but if they’re only stepbrothers, does that make the kid a prince or something else?”  
  
“And my joke became complicated,” Cross mumbled. “Well, I gotta go. I have some things to do. See you later.”  
  
“Bye,” Ink replied, hanging up.  
  
He spun back around in his chair to return to his work on his fanfiction.  
  
-  
-  
  
Meanwhile in the Jovel twin household, trouble had arisen.  
  
Nevin stared at his computer screen with intensity, a needless amount of thoughts running through his head at what was before him.  
  
_Cross had sent him a friend request on Facebook._  
  
Was that guy trying to insert himself into Nevin’s life?  
  
Nevin wondered why he even had a Facebook account. He never used it for anything. Well, he would like to think that he never used it for anything. When he was fourteen and still at his previous school, he whined a lot on it about subjects he had no proper judgment in and acted like an emo kid in general. He’d deleted most of those posts, hoping that no one would remember the cringy things he said.  
  
Now his timeline was mostly empty, consisting only of pictures that Drew had tagged him in and a random picture of pizza that he couldn’t remember why was there.  
  
His thoughts promptly returned to the matter at hand, which was Cross sending him a friend request. He noticed that the guy’s profile picture was a really stupid picture of him posing in front of what looked like the welcome sign for Las Vegas.  
  
Nevin sighed, just giving in and accepting the request. It’s not like he ever used his Facebook account, anyway. And fortunately, from the look of Cross’s timeline, he didn’t use his too often either. It was odd that he sent him a friend request, then.  
  
Unless he didn’t know how else to express the fact that he wanted to be friends.  
  
What a nerd.  
  
Nevin closed his laptop and put his head on his desk. They were already on the evening of day three since part of the school exploded and he still hadn’t done anything that made him feel like he was doing something good with his time. Granted, their free time was running over the weekend and it was currently Saturday evening, but still.  
  
What could he possibly do?  
  
He was inexplicably exhausted. Not sleepy, but his head felt heavy–perhaps a result of too much worrying over Drew for all the reasons he had. He really just wanted to get out of the house. He realized that he hadn’t left the house all day; no wonder he felt like he hadn’t accomplished anything.  
  
Nevin glanced out the window, seeing that the sun was setting. It wasn’t too late…  
  
He sighed, getting up from his chair and throwing a coat and shoes on. He felt this random desire to go on a walk.  
  
“ _Haha, yeah… a walk_ ,” Nevin thought.  
  
He chuckled at the recollection of a certain abridged series. Though, he wasn’t intending to destroy anything as the line may have implied.  
  
Maybe.  
  
Nevin stuck his phone in his pocket and made his way down the stairs of their house. Drew was laying on the couch, playing a PSP. He glanced up and noticed his twin coming down the stairs with shoes on.  
  
“Are you going somewhere?” Drew asked.  
  
“Yeah, just for a random walk,” Nevin told him. “That’s fine, right? Don’t need anything?”  
  
“I’ll be fine. It won’t be long before Grandma’s back. I’ll tell her where you went.”  
  
“All right. Bye,” Nevin said, waving and going out the front door.  
  
Thankfully the weather was mild, because he’d forgotten to consider the conditions of it beforehand. Nonetheless, the weather conditions were typically better here than they’d been in Michigan.  
  
It _was_ southern California, after all.  
  
Nevin walked along the sidewalk, unsure of a destination. He let himself wander, going wherever he felt, turning where he had a feeling to, focusing on the occasional breeze on his face and the colors of the changing leaves on the trees.  
  
Ten minutes in, he found himself at the entrance to a park in the middle of town. He spotted a few runners, a number of people who were probably students at Foxfield in some respective groups, some parents with their kids at the playground…  
  
It was such a joyful atmosphere. Everyone seemed so _content_. Which was unusual… there was always someone feeling down, unsure, or anxious…  
  
Nevin wasn’t complaining. His mind would constantly be bombarded by so many drastically different emotions at a time to the point where the overwhelming feeling of it had dulled down. He had a unique comprehension of the feelings of others. After all, that was one of his ‘gifts’. Empathy on steroids, as he liked to call it.  
  
And now, he could finally _relax_ , even if just for a moment, as long as nothing stupid happened. He sat down on a bench and closed his eyes, focusing on his senses–  
  
“Holy shit, it’s the king!”  
  
Cue stupid thing.  
  
“ _GOD DAMMIT_ ,” Nevin thought.  
  
Sure enough, he sensed it. An obtrusive aura that Nevin would have liked to describe as ‘excessively smug’, accompanied with surprise of various levels from multiple sources.  
  
Error was strutting down the sidewalk, sunglasses and hat on and hands in his pockets, six uniformly-dressed minions walking in formation behind him. Error was pulling the ‘wearing the cap way too high up’ look, the bill of it basically pointing upwards. It looked ridiculous. Nevin was rather surprised that the gentle breeze wasn’t blowing it the frick off his head.  
  
Nevin groaned, standing up from his spot on the bench with the intention of slipping away. He did not want to deal with this right now.  
  
“Well! Look who it is!” Error yelled out, taking his sunglasses off and putting them in his pocket. “It’s the emo kid!”  
  
Nevin froze in place.  
  
“ _WHY_ ,” he thought, profanities of disbelief flying through his thoughts. He growled, his eyes changing color for just a moment. He shook his head, attempting to compose himself just a little before turning around. “What do you want?” he asked Error, raising his voice a bit. Other people in the park glanced over, but only momentarily, as they really didn’t want to get involved.  
  
“Oh, nothing much,” Error replied, a threatening undertone to his voice. “You know, hmm…” He put a curled finger to his chin. “I think I’d _really_ like to talk to you, actually. There are some things that I’ve been wanting to _ask you_ for a while now.”  
  
“OOOH WITH YOUR FISTS?!” one of his minions asked, bouncing up and down.  
  
“Shut up Cody,” another one of the minions said.  
  
“Look, I really don’t have time for this,” Nevin stated, crossing his arms. “I’m certain you have something better to do with your time, as well.”  
  
“Yeah, um, how bout I do anyway,” Error said, snapping his fingers. The two minions in the back of the group, the biggest and scariest ones, approached Nevin and seized him by his arms. Nevin just made an exasperated face, not fighting them–what was the point in attempting escape? It would only set an image for him that he didn’t want, plus he really didn’t want to run right then.  
  
“Really, you’re doing this right now?” Nevin asked.  
  
Error signaled for his minions to follow him. They pulled Nevin along in the park, all of them getting a few looks from people. Error led them to a small, single-room building that looked like it wasn’t being used for anything.  
  
“I intend to speak to him privately… if you will attend to your business, my squad,” Error said, grabbing Nevin by his jacket. The minions saluted and ran off to go play Ultimate Frisbee a decent distance away.  
  
Error pulled out a key with his free hand, Nevin standing next to him with his arms crossed, rolling his eyes at the older boy next to him. What was he going to do, run? Why was he even holding onto him?  
  
Error pulled the door open, pushing Nevin into the room and entering behind him. He flipped the light switch on, revealing posters, beanbags, blankets, a small TV in the corner…  
  
“Welcome to the Park Lair, emo kid,” Error said.  
  
“What the hell, you have more than one lair?” Nevin asked. “Literally why. No wait, don’t answer. I don’t give a shit. What do you want. You already threw me down a set of stairs, isn’t that enough for you?”  
  
“I don’t think it was enough for _you_ ,” Error told him. “You know how I feel about people who disrespect me?”  
  
Nevin scoffed. “You like fucking them in closets?”  
  
Error grimaced.  
  
“Oh, yeah. Don’t think I haven’t heard about that.”  
  
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” Error said, a glare rising in his eyes as he stepped forward. “Is that some bullshit rumor?”  
  
“Well, there is talk of you dragging a certain someone who has less than a good relationship with you into closets on a regular basis,” Nevin told him, shrugging. “And about how he’s been giving you interesting looks lately.”  
  
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Error retorted. “Ink is a little bitch who finds joy in making my life as difficult as possible.”  
  
“And I don’t blame him.”  
  
Error grabbed Nevin by the front of his shirt and slammed him into a wall. Nevin made sure to tuck his head in to keep it from hitting the wall. “We’re not here so I can deal with your shit. There are a few things we need to go over. One, I’m in charge. It doesn’t bode well to actively oppose me. And two…” He leaned closer, staring Nevin right in the eyes. “Let’s just say my own curiosity has been a real _burden_.”  
  
“I suppose it’s only fair,” Nevin answered darkly, his eyes narrowing and one corner of his lips rising. He was almost amused…  
  
… because, as intimidating as he was attempting to be, Error was scared.  
  
Nevin’s eyes flashed to their cyan color, and Error flinched.  
  
“What’s the matter, Your Majesty? Are you _afraid_?” Nevin asked. He lowered his voice into a whisper. “Maybe you should forget about all this now.”  
  
“Shut the fuck up!” Error yelled, and his fist came flying towards Nevin’s face.  
  
Nevin caught it in his hand, a full smirk on his face by now. Error’s eyes widened, his whole arm shaking in Nevin’s grip. He let out a growl of pain as Nevin dug his nails into his hand.  
  
“I don’t take shit from people like you,” Nevin said. “Not anymore.”  
  
With a brisk shove from the smaller boy, Error found his back and head hitting the opposite wall hard enough to make him collapse. Nevin cracked his neck, walking up to him.  
  
“I have a concept for you,” he said, pushing his bangs aside. “You leave me and my brother alone, and I’ll leave you alone, removing needless violence from our lives. Are we clear?”  
  
Error looked up, vehemence in his eyes.  
  
“I don’t take _orders_ ,” he hissed.  
  
His hands flew up from his sides, strings shooting out of them. Nevin only had a moment to be surprised as they constricted his arms, and Error used them to slam him into the concrete walls before proceeding to crush him under the string’s pressure.  
  
Nevin’s hands twitched as he quickly thought through ways to escape this, but was unable to find much of anything. The strings wouldn’t snap no matter how hard he resisted them. Error walked up and punched him in the face, leaving him with a bloody nose.  
  
Nevin growled loudly, his eyes lighting up even more. He clenched his fists, something odd coursing through him. Something _different_.  
  
He mustered the strength to move his arm, slicing through the strings restricting him as he swung it upward. He punched Error in the stomach, sending him crumbling to his knees. Nevin momentarily glanced down at his arm, seeing a thin black line running across it, jutting slightly out as a blade of sorts. It quickly faded.  
  
That was new.  
  
Nevin didn’t take time to think more about the situation and hightailed out of there. He didn’t feel right. He couldn’t stand being there anymore.  
  
He ran, and he kept running until he could see his house.  
  
Just then, Nevin noticed that the side of his face felt cold, and he felt something running down his jawline. He wiped his face off with his hand, briefly touching his ear as well, which felt strangely wet.  
  
… was something coming out of his ear?  
  
He looked at the hand he had touched his face with.  
  
Black smears…?  
  
-  
-  
  
Angry knocking came to the front door of Blueberry’s fairly large house.  
  
He knew full well who it was, sighing and throwing his knitting needles onto the couch as he went to go get the door. Error stood on the other side of it, looking like a mixture of frustrated and dead inside.  
  
“You look awful,” Blueberry said. “Is your head bleeding? What happened?”  
  
“I’m crying on the inside,” Error stated, walking in and putting his head on Blueberry’s shoulder.  
  
“There, there, let me get the first aid kit,” Blueberry said, patting Error’s back. He pulled a kit out of a nearby drawer, like it was placed there on purpose. Which it probably was. “Did you get in a fight with someone?”  
  
Error let out a suffered cry as he plopped down on a couch.  
  
“It was fucking ridiculous,” he grumbled.  
  
Blueberry raised an eyebrow, looking unamused.  
  
“… sorry. I just. The kid is freakier than he looks.”  
  
“Do you want to tell me who it was?” Blueberry asked, pulling out a cloth and cleaning up the blood from Error’s head.  
  
“… You know the emo kid?” Error questioned. “He’s short. Black hair. The one with the twin.”  
  
“Oh, him,” Blueberry said, handing Error an ice bag. “Nevin Jovel. That’s what his name is. He’s the one who did this to you?”  
  
“Yeah, like holy crap what,” Error told him, still dumbfounded at the thought. “The kid is smaller than Ink and he fought almost _effortlessly_ , until I had to start using my powers to back me up. Although, I drew a conclusion about this.”  
  
“And that is?”  
  
“I told you I thought he was somehow connected to supernatural stuff. Eyes changing color and all that. Well, I’m starting to think that he has some kind of crazy strength thing going on, and that’s what was backing him up. I did experience it firsthand.”  
  
“So Nevin has super strength?” Blueberry asked, starting to clean the injury.  
  
“That’s what I thought initially, but then there was _more_ ,” Error continued, wincing. “He couldn’t break my strings with his strength, but then he just sliced through them with his _arm_. It even made a slicing sound. I don’t know how he did it. I didn’t have time to figure it out.”  
  
“Maybe he just had a knife in his sleeve,” Blueberry suggested. “You might’ve not seen it.”  
  
Error shrugged. “In any case, that kid is dangerous to a concerning point.”  
  
“Then just leave him alone. You’re the one who approached him, weren’t you?” Blueberry asked, starting to put bandages on.  
  
Error pouted a little, looking away. “… so what if I was?”  
  
Blueberry sighed. “Look, Error, I know you have undeniable interest in the supernatural. And I know that sometimes you approach these situations differently. But you can’t let your personal feelings towards people who don’t like you mix with your curiosity. That’s what causes things like _this_ to happen. Or what causes bad relationships with the people you want to learn more about. You understand where I’m coming from?”  
  
“Blue, I didn’t ask for advice,” Error grumbled.  
  
Blueberry gave the left side of Error’s chest a gentle pat. “Your heart was asking for it.”  
  
Error blinked. “What.”  
  
“Now, is there anything else that needs tending to aside from your habitual mentalities?” Blue asked with a smile.  
  
Error let out a huff of air. “I got socked, but the ice is fine.”  
  
The two of them were quiet for a bit. Error was still looking a bit unsure of himself.  
  
“You don’t have to go yet if you don’t want to. Wanna watch a movie?” Blueberry asked.  
  
Error nodded after a few moments.  
  
“… yeah,” he said, a small smile on his face.


	9. Something About

_**Chris:** What? What the pickle do you mean I can’t make tacos in the damn kitchen?_  
  
_**Nevin:** I mean I don’t trust you in my kitchen, you almost blew it up last time!_

 _ **Chris:** That’s bullcrap! I’ve been framed! It was my evil twin, Wesley!_  
  
_**Nevin:** LIES. You dare pretend to have an evil twin? That’s an offense to existing evil twins. And I’m certain that you know I AM one._  
  
_**Chris:** Well if it wasn’t Wesley, then who was it?_  
  
**_(Error crashes through the wall.)_**  
  
_**Error:** IT WAS ME ALL ALONG_  
  
_**Chris:** HWHAT_  
  
_**Nevin: (pulls out frying pan)** GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY HOUSE_  
  
Ink put his head on his table, sniggering to himself.  
  
What the actual hell was he doing?  
  
_**Chris:** Oh Nevin. You’ve saved me from the corrupted King of Popular Stereotypes and Jackasses. You have my undying love and appreciation._  
  
_**Nevin:** no problem my sweet princess. I am sorry for ever doubting you._  
  
_**Nevin:** by the way, marry me you extremely white nerd._  
  
_**Chris:** hell yes._  
  
Ink’s phone suddenly started vibrating, in spite of the late hour. He looked over at it, not recognizing the number, and not seeing a name, either.  
  
“This better not be Error,” he grumbled, answering the call and holding it up to his ear. “Hello?”  
  
“Hello, Isaac,” a somewhat ominous young man’s voice greeted slowly from the other end.  
  
“Uh… who is this?” Ink asked somewhat warily, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“You may or may not know about me. My name is Barry Price, but perhaps you know of me as Blueberry,” the caller said.  
  
Ink sighed. He still had no idea who it was. “Did Error tell you to call me for him?”  
  
"No, actually, I think he told me to not call you, but that wasn’t in our contract, so I did it anyway,” Blueberry said.  
  
"… Contract. Uh huh. So why exactly are you calling me?” Ink asked. “I don’t think I actually know you.”  
  
"You have an interesting relationship with Error, don’t you?” Blueberry asked him. “I just want you to know… he gets himself into a lot of messes that he doesn’t mean to. So…”  
  
Ink furrowed his brow. “Wait, is this some attempt to get me to be nicer to him or something?”  
  
"Oh, what? No no no, I don’t care about that. I'm calling to tell you that he and Nevin, whom I’m sure you know of, had a little bit of an… encounter, in which he took a bit of a beating in,“ Blueberry said. “If he randomly takes any anger out on you, you’ll know the reason why.”  
  
“Pft, wait, he got the crap beaten out of him by that guy? Hey. I need details,” Ink told him.  
  
"I don’t believe I’m at liberty to give you details. I do have some respect for Error, being a friend of his. If you want to know, I'd suggest getting those details yourself. I’m afraid I must take my leave now. Stay safe, Isaac. Things have taken a turn for the strange as of late. Oh, and one more thing. I wouldn’t recommend telling anyone about this conversation.”  
  
The line went dead.  
  
“A turn for the strange? What the hell?” Ink said to himself, putting his phone down. “What does that even mean?”  
  
He let out a pondering hum, propping an elbow on his table and leaning into his hand.  
  
The last time someone said something like that, part of the school blew up. Granted, it was the creepy janitor, who may or may not have been responsible for the incident. But why would this guy named Barry say it? He clearly had a connection to Error, too. Enough of one to even consider him a friend on top of doing something he may not like.  
  
In the very least, Error had one normal friend, if that was the case.  
  
Ink reached for one of his sketchbooks, but paused, letting out another sigh. He didn’t feel like drawing at all.  
  
He was so _bored_ , he was uninspired.  
  
He felt this random urge to sneak out and do something really stupid, even though it was about ten at night.  
  
It wasn’t like he’d have to sneak out anyway. His parents probably wouldn’t notice, and even if they did, they wouldn’t care. Though, it wasn’t negligence as it may have sounded–it was partially lenience. Although his parents were both full-time workers with demanding jobs, and it’d been that way since Ink was about twelve, they were typically relaxed people, and while Ink felt somewhat distanced from them, they didn’t always disregard him by any means and still spent time together occasionally.  
  
It was something that he’d just gotten used to.  
  
Maybe his parents would care if he’d gone out and majorly vandalized the school, or participated in a gang robbery, but it wasn’t like he was intending to do that.  
  
Ink wasn’t tired at all, and going out for a little bit didn’t seem so bad… He had no idea what he wanted to do, but he wanted to do something.  
  
Something that would make him _feel something_.  
  
He gazed out the window from his position. The bright moonlight was illuminating his room, the moon being full that night.  
  
Eh.  
  
Ink changed his mind, randomly losing the desire to go outside. What would that accomplish? It was late at night, and it would be lame if no one was going with him, and if he had no ideas of where to go.  
  
Instead, he made the totally smart decision of looking up indie horror games to occupy himself with.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Isaac! Isaac, sweetie? Are you awake?”  
  
Ink shifted on his bed, lifting his head up from his pillow in response to the knocking on his door. He wiped the drool from his face, turning his head towards the door as it opened.  
  
“I made breakfast. Would you like to come down and eat?"  
  
“Huh? Oh, yeah… sure…” Ink mumbled, still half-asleep. “Thanks, Mom…”  
  
His mom left the doorway, heading back down the stairs. Ink sat up, regretting his decision to play the game that he had until like two in the morning. He’d come across a deceiving visual novel game that was disguised as a regular dating sim, but was actually a psychological horror game. It was great and scared the crap out of him, but had deprived him of several hours of sleep, and the few that he got were haunted by less than pleasant dreams.  
  
He laughed, face in his pillow. So worth it.  
  
Ink reached over to his phone on his bedside table and started texting Cross.  
  
_“hey C I just played this visual novel game called doki doki literature club”_  
  
_“it’s great you should play it the name is really misleading”_  
  
_“also it’s free just google it or get it on steam”_  
  
Ink got up, taking his phone with him to the bathroom. It wasn’t long before it vibrated, indicating a response.  
  
_“doki doki literature club? wtf”_  
  
_“that sounds stereotypically anime”_  
  
Ink texted back.  
  
_“that’s what the game wants you to think”_  
  
Ink was pulling his toothbrush and toothpaste out when his phone sounded from a response.  
  
_“cool, something to do today”_  
  
Ink chuckled to himself, pocketing his phone. He couldn’t wait for Cross’s reaction to the game.  
  
A few minutes later, Ink headed downstairs to see his mom in the kitchen, cooking various things that all smelled amazing. As expected, she had called him down before the food was actually done so he would come down on time. It was a clever strategy.  
  
“Good morning,” Ink said monotonously, crashing on the couch in the living room.  
  
“Isaac, please go sit at the table,” his mom said, in the process of cooking some eggs. “You aren’t going to want to get back up.”  
  
“Mom, I already don’t,” he answered, lying down sideways.  
  
“How much did you sleep last night?” she asked. “Just because you’re on a break doesn’t mean you suddenly don’t need to sleep.”  
  
“Okay, yeah, I didn’t really sleep,” Ink admitted. “But even when I did try to sleep, I couldn’t fall asleep.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” his mom said. “But why do you think that might’ve happened? Were you on your computer too late?”  
  
Ink let out a short groan from his position on the couch.  
  
His mother sighed. “I thought so. Come on in, Isaac, the food is done.”  
  
Ink groggily lifted himself up from the couch and walked over to the kitchen table in the worst possible posture known to man. He sat down in his typical seat and laid his head in his arms on the table.  
  
“Are you doing okay, sweetie?” his mom asked, putting a plate of food down in front of him.  
  
“I’m just tired,” he answered, lifting himself up. “Where’s Dad?”  
  
“Still sleeping. He had to work yesterday, and work late, at that.”  
  
Must’ve been _that_ time at the studio.  
  
Ink looked down at his plate of food. Damn, it was like something you’d get at a breakfast buffet. There was french toast, scrambled eggs, potatoes, _and_ bacon. Ink looked over at the stove, seeing that his mom had made hot chocolate too.  
  
Okay, she was amazing. She rarely made breakfast, but when she did, she went all out. Of course, this meant that Ink would probably be the one washing the dishes, but he didn’t care, he was just glad that he had food made for him.  
  
“Thanks for making this, Mom,” he said.  
  
She smiled, giving him a cup of hot chocolate with mini marshmallows and a piece of chocolate in it and sitting down on the side of the table opposite to him.  
  
“So, Isaac,” his mother started, “I understand that we haven’t had much time to talk lately. I know you probably don’t want to talk about school, but how is it going?”  
  
Ink was pouring hot syrup on his french toast. “Eh,” he replied with a shrug. “It’s school. I’m doing okay, same old, nothing out of the ordinary.”  
  
“I guess I shouldn’t have expected much else,” his mom said with a laugh. “How are you and your friend doing? His name was Chris, right?”  
  
“Yeah,” Ink answered. “We’re fine.”  
  
“Can you tell me about him? I don’t think you’ve ever told me what he’s like.”  
  
Ink had shoved food in his mouth already. “Oh, yeah,” he said, swallowing it. “He’s a pretty nice guy. We have a lot of the same interests. In terms of hobbies, at least.”  
  
“What does he look like?”  
  
“He’s really blonde and pale and like six feet tall. He also has sensitive eyes or something so he wears sunglasses a lot.” Of course, that wasn’t the real reason Cross wore sunglasses all the time.  
  
Ink’s mom rose an eyebrow as he sipped his hot chocolate.  
  
“Do you like him?” she asked.  
  
Ink choked a little.  
  
“Mom, oh my god,” he said, putting his mug down and wiping his mouth off. “I don’t see him like that.”  
  
“Really?” she asked. “Is there anyone you do?”  
  
“My romantic life is literally nonexistent. And I am _not_ in a hurry.”  
  
Ink could already tell from the look on his mom’s face that this just reinforced her idea of him eventually getting together with Cross. It was too late.  
  
Ink really couldn’t see it. All things considered, he didn’t know why. It would make sense. He and Cross had a lot in common. He was happier since meeting him, and the two had become friends surprisingly quickly. But it just didn’t line up that way.  
  
“Okay. Well, I won’t pressure you,” his mom said. “I’ll let you eat now.”  
  
At least Ink didn’t have to mention anything about Error. That was good.  
  
Ink always tried to avoid talking about Error as much as he could, for obvious reasons. He did _not_ want his parents involved in any part of that.  
  
His parents didn’t even know he had powers, so it would be a mess. Ink often thought about telling them, but what good would it do? He didn’t want to have to worry about it. It was easier to just not tell _anyone_.  
  
It was only thanks to Error that literally anyone found out. Cross probably wouldn’t even know if it weren’t for him. Well, maybe it would’ve happened eventually, with Cross having powers too and all, but certainly not at the point that it had. After all, Error was the one who dragged them both out and told Cross about Ink’s powers entirely without consent.  
  
Speaking of which… what were the chances?  
  
Ink had never met anyone else with strange powers prior to meeting Error. For the longest time, he didn’t think there _was_ anyone else. Sure, there had always been rumors floating around in Foxfield High that weird stuff went on, but nothing weird had actually happened. Then, that one fateful day, Ink found out about Error, and one thing after another just kept coming up.  
  
Was it even a coincidence?  
  
Did Error just draw in these kinds of disasters wherever he went?  
  
“ _Oh my god, Error is Haruhi Suzumiya_ ,” Ink thought as he ate his bacon. “ _It all makes sense now_.”  
  
-  
-  
  
Nevin inspected his ear in the mirror, checking to see if any more of that weird black substance had come out of his ear while he was sleeping.  
  
There didn’t seem to be any trace of it, which was good, in a way.  
  
What even was it? His ear hadn’t hurt or even felt weird when it happened. It just happened. He had wiped it off, but it soon dissolved back into his skin. Nevin had concluded that it was connected to his powers, though–there was no other explanation for it, especially after that move he pulled completely by accident.  
  
He thought that he was finally starting to understand what exactly his powers were, but apparently there was even more to them than he thought.  
  
Sure, it was interesting. But this was only manageable if there was no physical evidence of them! What was he supposed to do if this happened again and Drew saw it?  
  
At least he had time to collect himself. He was alone in his house right now, because for some strange reason, Drew had decided to go to church with their grandma. What was up with that? Nevin wasn’t going to try and impose his own ideas onto his brother, but it happened out of no where.  
  
Nevin sighed, heading into his room. He sat down on the ground and opened up a cabinet drawer, going through his video games. He wanted to fill time and think about something else, but he didn’t really feel like it…  
  
This case about the new powers was bothering him too much–he had to know what they were. He shifted into a cross-legged position, looking down at his arms. He concentrated his energy, his eyes flashing to cyan.  
  
This was probably a terrible idea.  
  
He clenched his fists and tensed his muscles. Nothing. He started at them and furrowed his brow like he could scare something into happening. Nevin sighed, dropping his arms and his eyes turning to their normal color. Maybe it was an adrenaline thing.  
  
“I could always do some parkour to get it to come back out,” he mumbled to himself, scoffing at his own dry joke.  
  
He got to his feet, wandering downstairs into the kitchen and going through the cupboards for no apparent reason. He wanders out, crashing onto the couch. God, he needed _something_ to entertain him. His feelings could easily be described as dead inside. He needed something new…  
  
Nevin bit his lip, looking down. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.  
  
It was time.  
  
Time to establish a social life.  
  
This was an even more horrible idea than trying to summon his new powers.  
  
“Wait, frick, I don’t even have his damn phone number,” he grumbled.  
  
Well, there went that idea. Like he had the motivation to walk a few houses down the street. It wasn’t like he knew which one was Cross’s, anyway.  
  
He wasn’t partial to Cross’s company, it just seemed like the best bet because he was in a position for it to be practical and he lived nearby and they had already interacted and he didn’t want him to get too close to Drew so…!  
  
Nevin stopped, letting out a bit of a groan. What the hell was the point of making excuses to himself? Just because he had established himself as a loner didn’t mean that he had to adhere to that _forever_.  
  
It was okay for him to have friends. He was already lucky that they at least had something in the common. Mainly, the advantage was that Cross already knew about his powers so he wouldn’t have to hide them.  
  
There was something about Cross that intrigued him, too.  
  
He’d told Nevin that he had problems with a ghost being attached to him, and how it was the cause of his eye being red, but… did he have any powers? Nevin may have been jumping to conclusions, but it was rather strange that Error and Ink both had powers of some kind, and Cross just… had nothing significant.  
  
Why even was there a ghost? Where did the ghost come from? Was it someone he knew? How long has it been there? Cross seemed to have an antipathetic attitude towards it, was it merely caused by the ghost trying to control him or did he have a personal relationship with it that caused him to hate it? How often did these things happen? Did the ghost have a personality or was it just some kind of entity thing?  
Nevin had told Cross earlier that he didn’t really care how it happened, but the more he thought about it, the more interesting it was.  
  
His gaze drifted over to the table next to the couch, noticing a familiar smartphone on it. Was it Drew’s phone? Unsurprisingly, his brother must have forgotten it. That happened more often than it should have. Nevin couldn’t count the amount of times he had tried to contact Drew while he was away and the darn thing would just ring upstairs.  
  
Nevin looked back and forth, as if someone could be watching, before picking up the phone, turning it on and unlocking it. Yeah, he _kind of_ knew Drew’s passcode. It was rather unethical to go snooping through his phone, but hey, it wasn’t like he would get caught.  
  
Nevin smiled weakly to himself, seeing that the background was a picture of him and Drew. He glanced over the lock screen and went through a few principal apps, not finding anything particularly interesting.  
  
Suddenly, he remembered that Drew and Cross had actually given each other their phone numbers yesterday. His initial plan rekindled, he pulled his own phone back out, located Cross’s number in Drew’s contacts and started dialing.  
  
Wait… maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe it would’ve been better to spend the day watching stuff on Youtube, or playing a video game, or maybe a movie would be…  
  
“Frick it, nothing can stop me,” Nevin said aloud, finishing dialing and putting Drew’s phone back to where it was, being sure to set it back to the home screen. He put his call on speaker and it only rang once before he got an answer.  
  
“Hello?” Cross said, sounding confused.  
  
“Uh… hi,” Nevin started awkwardly. “This is Nevin. You know. Your neighbor.”  
  
AGH, TALKING ON THE PHONE.  
  
“What’s up?” Cross asked.  
  
“Are you… doing anything right now?” Nevin asked.  
  
“Huh? Um…” Cross stammered slightly, thinking about it. “Not really.”  
  
Nevin took a deep breath. “Do… you want to come over or something? I mean… if you're doing something else then just…” He trailed off.  
  
“Dude, totally!” Cross said. "Is there something in particular or just nah…?”  
  
“Not really, I'm just kinda really bored,” Nevin admitted. “There’s no one else around right now.”  
  
“Where’s your brother?” Cross asked.  
  
"At church.”  
  
"He goes to church?”  
  
“No, not really.”  
  
“… huh.”  
  
The doorbell rang. Nevin got up and answered it, to see Cross on the other side of it already.  
  
“What the hell, did you run here?” Nevin asked.  
  
“Just briefly,” Cross answered. “It’s only two houses.”  
  
“Well,” Nevin started expectantly, “come in then.”  
  
Cross pulled his sunglasses off his face, pocketed them and walked inside. As had become normal, his right eye almost glowed a blood red. It must have sucked to wear the dark shades all the time, especially when the weather was gloomy like it was that day.  
  
“It’s so nice to not have to worry about wearing these, you have no idea,” Cross stated. “I swear I’m gonna frick up my eyesight doing this.”  
  
“I’ve been wondering,” Nevin said, “why do you wear them? I mean yeah, it stands out and people suck sometimes, but it seems like way too much of a hassle when you don’t even know if it’ll have any significant effect on the way people generally think.”  
  
Cross tilted his head slightly, emitting a pondering hum. “… Maybe so,” he said. “So like, what do you have in mind right now? Did you want to talk about something or maybe something else?”  
  
“Well… there _are_ things I would like to talk about, but not now,” Nevin told him. “Frankly, I’m sick of thinking about all this supernatural trash all the time. You want to play PS4?”  
  
“Hah, why does everyone own one of those except for me?” Cross wondered. “Sure, sounds great.” He started following Nevin up the stairs in the living room.  
  
“Everyone? How many people are you comparing yourself to?” Nevin asked with a short laugh.  
  
“… okay. Two people, one of which I’m currently standing next to. I don’t have a lot to work off of.” Cross laughed sheepishly, and Nevin found himself smiling.  
  
There was something about Cross that he’d failed to notice prior.  
  
There was something charming about him.


	10. Connections

Ink was finishing up his hot chocolate when the doorbell of their apartment suddenly rang. He turned around in his seat, looking at the door, wondering who the heck would be there on a Sunday morning. His mom got up to answer the door.  
  
“Oh, uh, hi.”  
  
Ink’s stomach dropped when he heard Error’s voice.  
  
“… Hello?” Ink’s mom greeted awkwardly.  
  
“Is Isaac home?” Error asked. “I’m a friend from school. I’m Edward.”  
  
Ink wanted to go hide in a closet. All was lost.  
  
… At least he didn’t introduce himself as ‘Error’.  
  
Ink had about two seconds to make a decision. He could either play along and go talk to Error, or he could tell his mom at least some aspects of the truth. It wasn’t like his mom wouldn’t believe him, and he might’ve been able to build a little bit of confidence that Error wouldn’t be coming back while his parents were around but…  
  
… god, he did not want to deal with any of this right now.  
  
“ _It’s too early for this bullshit,_ ” he thought, standing up from the table in a huff and walking over to the door. His mother turned her head, looking confused. “What do you want, Edward?”  
  
Ink’s mom momentarily looked like she wanted to scold him for his attitude, but she stayed silent, wondering what the full story was.  
  
“I need to talk to you about something,” Error said. “Something really important.”  
  
“So important that you’re standing in the doorway at 10:30 on a Sunday?” Ink asked.  
  
“Yes, that important…” Error started, glancing between the two Beamers and seeing food still on the table a ways back in the kitchen. “Am I interrupting? I’m really sorry.”  
  
“Oh, please, don’t worry,” Ink’s mom said.  
  
Ink’s eye twitched.  
  
Error was _not_ pulling the generic polite facade.  
  
Ink desperately wanted to get this over with; he just wanted Error to freaking leave.  
  
“Mom, can you give us a moment?” Ink asked. She gave a short nod, moving back into the kitchen. Ink walked out into the hallway.  
  
Once the door closed, Error’s face immediately contorted into a glare.  
  
Ink furrowed his brow. “Okay, what did I do?”  
  
“You know what you fucking did,” Error growled quietly.  
  
“Do I…?” Ink asked him.  
  
“You know it’s your fault!” Error elaborated very vaguely, still speaking under his breath. “The stupid rumor!”  
  
Ink rose an eyebrow, genuinely perplexed. “What rumor?” he asked.  
  
Error’s hands twitched, but he kept himself still. “You know what rumor! _That_ rumor! Don’t play innocent, you’re just trying to get me to say it!”  
  
“No, seriously, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Ink replied, slowly shaking his head. “There might be a rumor and I’m getting some ideas about what it is but really, I didn’t do anything.”  
  
“Like hell,” Error spat. “People literally think…” He growled angrily. “People think that we have some kind of intimate hate relationship! It’s fucking stupid and you’re responsible and I’m going to–”  
  
“Wait, what? Well. Duh,” Ink said, shrugging defensively. “If people catch us interacting as often as they do then of course they’re going to start spreading rumors.”  
  
“But you did it on–” Error was about to shout, but stopped himself. “You did it on purpose!” he said more quietly. “Don’t think I don’t know!”  
  
“Can you slow down? Why do you think it was me? There are people ten times more likely to spread rumors than me.”  
  
“Because… because!” Error snapped. “They literally think we’re fucking during school! In the goddamn _closets_! And gee, I wonder how many people saw it when we were talking in the closets? None.”  
  
“How do you know that? The likelihood of someone seeing that is way higher than you think. Where did you even hear the rumor, was it your minions or something?”  
  
Error paused for a moment. “Well…” he started, “… the emo kid.”  
  
“The emo kid?” Ink asked.  
  
“You know. The emo kid.”  
  
“The one with the glowy eyes?”  
  
“Yeah. That one.”  
  
“Yeah, his name is Nevin, not ‘emo kid’. Also, I’m pretty sure that explains a lot.”  
  
“What do you mean, explains a lot?” Error asked, furrowing his brow.  
  
Ink sighed. “I don’t think you’ve realized he doesn’t like you very much.”  
  
“Well–duh! Of course I realized that!” Error exclaimed. “But you don’t like me very much either!”  
  
“Oh, man. I was actually worried that you weren’t aware of that,” Ink said. Error frowned, unsure of how to react. “But really, how do you know he didn’t just make that up to piss you off and it’s not actually a rumor? Well. Yet.”  
  
“… You know, this isn’t frickin’ over,” Error stated, taking some steps back and pointing threateningly. “This war rages on.”  
  
“What does that even mean? Go home and go back to bed or something,” Ink told him.  
  
Error stormed away, angrily shaking his still-pointing hand as he left.  
  
Ink let out another sigh, wondering if things were going to get worse from here on out. If Nevin really was responsible, it wasn’t like he had the intention of sending Error after him, right? Of course not. Ink absolutely would’ve done the same thing, had he been more intent in screwing over Error’s reputation. If he was going to be honest, he had no interest in that.  
  
Nevin was probably just more interested in dealing some kind of convoluted justice. If that was the case, Ink had no desire to be involved in it, but unfortunately, he may have been stuck in the situation regardless. And with Error knowing his phone number and home address, avoiding him was becoming increasingly difficult.  
  
But what could he do about it? Not a lot. It would be more efficient to just not care.  
  
So why was it bothering him so much?  
  
Ink pulled out his phone, wanting something else to think about.  
  
_“hey C. can you actually come over?”_  
  
A few seconds passed.  
  
_“oh hey”_  
  
_“sorry i’m actually at nevin’s house right now haha”_  
  
Ink paused, simply staring at the screen in front of him for a few moments.  
  
_“hah I’m sure you are”_  
  
_“phase one achieved, or whatever phase that is”_  
  
Ink didn’t feel what he was typing at all.  
  
_“you wish. i’ll see if i can come over later”_  
  
Why was there a sinking feeling in his chest?  
  
_“all right”_  
  
Ink pocketed his phone, suddenly feeling uneasy for some reason.  
  
Cross and Nevin were hanging out, right? Wouldn’t Cross at least invite him? And if not, maybe they were getting closer to becoming a ‘thing’. Which was exactly what Ink wanted, jokingly, at least.  
  
So why wasn’t he feeling happy? It wasn’t jealously. What was it? Some overhanging feeling of dread…?  
  
Ink shrugged it off, returning to the kitchen.  
  
-  
-  
  
“He said it was the emo kid,” Error said into his phone, pulling his car out of the parking lot. “He fricking said it was the emo kid.”  
  
“I told you so,” Blueberry answered from the other end.  
  
“But I’m still not convinced, okay? There’s no evidence! Ink has to be responsible for at least some of it! It’s too _suspicious_!”  
  
“Guilty until proven innocent, huh…” Blueberry sighed. “Look, Error, I get that you’re enthusiastic about this, but I’m literally at church right now. It’s Sunday. Wouldn’t it be good to just take a break from this for a while? Maybe spend some time with your little brother?”  
  
“I’M FREAKING OUT AND I NEED TO TALK TO SOMEONE!” Error cried.  
  
“I’ll come by later, okay? Try doing something meditative like we talked about. Ciao,” Blueberry told him, hanging up. He rolled his eyes, putting his phone in his pocket. “Error needs Jesus…”  
  
As he was turning around to reenter the chapel, a shorter black-haired boy on crutches opened the door right in front of him.  
  
“O-oh, I’m sorry,” the boy apologized. He seemed familiar…  
  
“Hey, do I know you?” Blueberry asked, holding the door open for him. He had quickly recalled who the boy was and his full name, but he asked anyway because he didn’t think they’d actually met before. He’d made the mistake of doing otherwise before…  
  
Drew Jovel.  
  
“I… I don’t know,” Drew replied nervously. “Do we go to the same school?”  
  
“Oh, yeah, I think so,” Blueberry said. “Might’ve seen you in the halls a number of times. Remind me what your name is?”  
  
With further consideration, revealing that his knowledge of Drew was only through Error probably wasn’t the best idea. Understandably, Drew was probably rather intimidated by the school king.  
  
“… Drew?” the smaller boy answered slowly.  
  
“Oh, right!” Blueberry exclaimed. Yeah, he was tastefully acting. “You _are_ the guy who broke your leg, I thought so. I mean. Of course you are.” He smiled sheepishly, looking away for a moment. “Um… sorry.”  
  
“… don’t worry about it, things happen,” Drew replied. He seemed uncomfortable.  
  
“Ah, I’m Barry, by the way,” Blueberry added. “I’ve gotta head back in now. See you around, Drew.”  
  
He quietly entered through the double doors, leaving Drew out in the foyer with his thoughts.  
  
Ever since he’d broken his leg, suddenly everyone was recognizing him. He didn’t know if he liked it or if he didn’t. Something about it felt wrong… It felt like, because he was getting the attention over incapacitation, it wasn’t _real_ , or something. Like it was cheated.  
  
Drew didn’t want to become popular over something like this. Sure, being noticed and perhaps making some friends was good, but the potential consequences were already bothering him.  
  
Well, friends _would_ be good. Nevin had always scared people off, and maybe now Drew could finally have a chance to make some. Drew loved his brother, but Nevin was always strangely protective.  
  
Drew wished that Nevin would just take better care of himself, he was the one who actually needed it. Plus, Nevin had been acting strangely as of late. Drew thought for a little while that it was because of his broken leg, but it seemed to be leading to something else.  
  
In the very least, hopefully Nevin was using his time alone at home to think about some of this stuff. Drew just wanted his brother to be more open with him.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Hey, Nevin? I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Cross started, glancing over at the boy sitting next to him who was making some selections in their game. “Did something happen to you?”  
  
“What are you talking about?” Nevin asked, not looking back at him.  
  
“Your face is kinda bruised,” Cross told him.  
  
Nevin blinked. “… Oh, right, I guess it is,” he replied, shrugging it off.  
  
Cross furrowed his brow a bit. Nevin was being vague, and he probably wasn’t in a position to pry. However, the appearance of it was all too familiar–it was probably from getting punched.  
  
… By whom?  
  
“ _…_ _God dammit Error,_ ” Cross thought, resisting the urge to face palm.  
  
Sure, he didn’t have evidence that it was Error, but it was a reasonable assumption based on recent events. Did Nevin get into a fight with him?  
  
Nevin let out a pondering hum, one that sounded rather dissatisfied.  
  
“Do you want to play something else?” he asked.  
  
“Oh, uh… sure,” Cross answered. “You know, Isaac was telling me about this free game that he played last night. Maybe we could play it, if you’re willing to download it… I mean, I would use my laptop, but I left it at home.”  
  
“What game?” Nevin asked him, shutting off the console.  
  
“I dunno, I think he said it was called, like… Doki Doki Literature Club or something? He said something about it being a misleading anime game.”  
  
“Oh, _that_ ,” Nevin said. “A bunch of Youtubers have been playing it lately. I think it’s some kind of horror game. I haven’t watched any gameplay of it because I was thinking about playing it.”  
  
The two of them were quiet.  
  
Nevin looked over at the laptop on the couch for just a moment before grabbing it and opening it up. Cross scooted in next to him, looking over his shoulder. The background was from the Legend of Zelda and there were four folders, one labeled ‘Nightmare King’, another labeled ‘Teddy Bear’, another labeled ‘Games’ and the last called ‘Random Crap’.  
  
“Nightmare King? Is that you?” Cross asked with a laugh. “Where’d that name come from?”  
  
“It’s an adopted title,” Nevin told him, opening up an internet browser. “It was some stupid name I got at my last school in Michigan. People were going around calling me ‘the nightmare kid’ because it got out that I wasn’t exactly normal, and was involved in a couple incidents. I prefer to not look back on it, but I thought the name was funny.”  
  
“You’re from Michigan? How’d you end up moving all the way here?”  
  
“I dunno, my grandma had been talking about it for a while,” Nevin said. “Our last school sucked, anyway.”  
  
Cross’s eyes widened with surprise. “Wait, you live with your grandma?”  
  
Nevin half-smiled just a bit, searching up the game. “What, wasn’t all the old-fashioned furniture a giveaway?”  
  
“… Is it too much to ask why? Sorry if it is,” Cross said.  
  
Nevin’s smile diminished, and he was quiet for a few moments. “… just… some family complications.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Cross quickly apologized again.  
  
“Don’t be,” Nevin said with a shrug. “What matters is that it’s not a problem anymore.”  
  
The statement was sending a number of scenarios through Cross’s head. Maybe he was overthinking it, but what if those complications were something that had hurt him? There were so many possibilities. Sure, it could’ve been something simpler, but… what if it wasn’t?  
  
Cross put the thoughts aside. It wasn’t his business.  
  
Nevin had opened up homepage of the game, which was pink and white and covered in polka-dots. The top of the page read “Will you write your way into her heart?” and the trailer was set below it.  
  
“This looks cheesy,” Nevin commented, laughing. “Can’t wait to play it.” He scrolled down a bit, and what looked like the main characters could be seen. They were…  _extremely_ anime.  
  
“Are they standing on top of a fan or something? What the actual heck?” Cross said, also laughing now. “Look at her, her skirt is literally sticking in the air behind her.”  
  
Nevin clicked the download button and breezed through the few additional steps.  
  
“Wait wait, there’s text down there, we have to read it,” Cross told him. Nevin scrolled down a little more while the game was downloading. Cross hemmed and started reading it in a high-pitched voice. “ _Hi, Monika here!_ ”  
  
“Oh my god,” Nevin said, sniggering.  
  
“ _Welcome to the Literature Club! It’s always been a dream of mine to make something special out of the things I love! Now that you’re a club member, you can help me make that dream come true in this cute game!_ ”  
  
“I have so many doubts about this.”  
  
Cross read through the rest of the small dialogue, maintaining the high-pitched voice all the way. It introduced the four girls that would be in the game, one of them being ‘Monika’ herself, the leader of them all. At the end was a somewhat disconcerting note asking the reader to spend the most time with her, finished with a little heart.  
  
“Yeah, no thanks Monika,” Nevin stated.  
  
“I’m placing my bets, she’s going to be evil somehow,” Cross said.  
  
The game finished downloading and Nevin opened it up. They were greeted by a splashscreen saying “This game is not for those who are easily disturbed.”  
  
Cross rubbed his hands together eagerly. “Oh, I’m so ready.”  
  
-  
-  
  
A few hours later…  
  
Ink’s phone buzzed. He picked it up, seeing texts from Cross.  
  
_“ISAAC WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS GAME”_  
  
Ink almost dropped his phone, raising his hand to cover his mouth as he resisted the urge to burst out laughing.  
  
_“WHAT THE ACTUAL EVER LIVING EVENING DISHWASHER SOAP DID YOU RECOMMEND ME”_  
  
Ink responded with a simple smiley face.  
  
_“YOU LITTLE FRICKER”_  
  
_“I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS RIGHT NOW”_  
  
_“SO MANY TERRIBLE FEELINGS”_  
  
_“NEVIN AND I BOTH CALLED IT BUT I STILL HAVE SO MANY TERRIBLE FEELINGS”_  
  
Ink paused.  
  
Nevin?  
  
_“so you’re playing the game with him?”_  
  
Cross took a moment to respond.  
  
_“oh yeah, he wanted to play it too so we’re just playing it together. we were doing a lot of stupid voices but now it doesn’t seem appropriate anymore”_  
  
_“ANYWAY WHAT THE HELL”_  
  
Ink thought for a moment. Maybe the two of them hanging out wouldn’t be bad. If anything, he might even be indirectly getting a new friend and Cross would be doing all the work. Nevin was interesting, after all. Plus, they had their shared disliking of Error.  
  
_“just you wait, C. it gets worse. :)”_  
  
_“great. can’t wait.”_  
  
Ink smiled to himself.  
  
_“by the way, monika is the best wife :)”_  
  
_“STOP”_


	11. Just Great

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get a little weird.

“From your prison in the darkest and edgiest depths of the edgy dark darkness, hear our cry from the outer world… Egredere! Egredere!”  
  
The girl holding a smartphone read aloud as others with her lit candles set in a circle around an open laptop in the dark basement.  
  
“Waifu Lord of Poetry! No longer shall your chains to your cursed world bind you! Come forth and join us in our plane! Libertatum tuum est!” she called out, dramatically throwing her hand forward anime style. “All right guys, now everybody slowly chant _Just Monika_ eight times.”  
  
_“Just Monika.”_  
  
_“Just Monika.”_  
  
_“Just Monika–“_  
  
The flames on the candles began to grow. Some of other girls in the room proceeded with hesitation and concern, but the girl with the book remained resolute. They continued chanting, the laptop beginning to spark and the ground even shaking slightly. The latter may have been their imagination, though.  
  
“Uh… Dez? This may have been a bad idea–”  
  
“THERE IS NO TURNING BACK!” the resolute girl declared, pointing ceilingward. The candle flames were twitching from some unseen disturbance, and the laptop was sporadically emitting strange buzzing noises, as if it was malfunctioning. The computer started to play the theme song as the game opened without prompt, the notes distorting as it continued. “NOW SING!”  
  
_“EVERY DAY, I IMAGINE A FUTURE WHERE I CAN BE WITH YOU!”_  
  
_“IN MY HAND IS A PEN THAT WILL WRITE A POEM OF ME AND YOU–”_  
  
The laptop sparked dangerously, the candles extinguished and the power in the whole house suddenly blacked out.  
  
Everything was quiet.  
  
“Is everyone all right?” one of the girl’s voiced chirped up after a little while, turning on her phone’s flashlight. Others soon followed.  
  
“Did it work?!” Dez practically shouted. “That felt like an interruption! Monika! Have you truly joined us at last?”  
  
“Why are you talking like that?” another girl asked.  
  
“Shut up Stacy, this is serious!”  
  
They all inspected the room with their phone flashlights. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. No Monika. The candles had blown out, the laptop had shut off… It seemed like a failure, and it was unknown the reason why.  
  
“Oh, forget this,” another girl said. She pocketed her phone, heading towards the stairs. “I’m going home, guys.”  
  
“But Rachel! It’s still so early, we can try again–!” Dez started, going after her, but Rachel shook her head.  
  
“I’m not feeling great, anyway.”  
  
The other girls ended up letting her go, following her up the stairs to wave her off from the front door. She quietly headed down the sidewalk, hands in the pockets of her designer jacket. When she was certain she was out of sight, she smiled, green eyes twinkling for a moment in the sunset.  
  
_Freedom at last._  
  
-  
-  
  
_“Hey, Chris. I just wanted to tell you that it was really fun playing that game with you, as weird as it was. We should play dumb stuff together again sometime. Or just stuff in general. It was fun.”_  
  
Cross smiled at the text he’d received from Nevin, sitting at the desk in his room.  
  
_“yeah i think so too! hope it can be soon!!”_  
  
For some reason, in spite of the later hour, he had so much energy left. Maybe it was persisting adrenaline from the somewhat nerve-wracking game they’d just played, but he felt really happy.  
  
Nevin was so much nicer than he came off to be. Cross could hardly believe that Nevin had initially terrified him–it was almost like he was a totally different person at home, something which he’d come to learn.  
  
Suddenly, Cross paused, realizing something.  
  
Hadn’t he told Ink that he would see if he could go over to his house that day…?  
  
“Frick,” he muttered. He quickly checked through his phone, but there was no evidence of any attempts at contact from Ink. He didn’t have any excuses–he was at Nevin’s house for most of the day. If he’d just been a little more attentive, he could’ve avoided this, but…  
  
… well, he really wanted to finish the entire game…  
  
_“agggg isaac i’m really sorry i didn’t end up coming over”_  
  
Cross sat there nervously, waiting for a reply. It didn’t seem like he was going to get one right away; the message wasn’t even being labeled as read.  
  
_“do you still want me to?? I can come over now”_  
  
Cross sat there for two full minutes and there was no reply. He heaved a sigh, throwing his phone onto his bed and sitting down at his desk to open his laptop.  
  
It wasn’t for twenty minutes that he got a response from Ink. His phone dinged behind him and the message also popped up on his desktop. Cross clicked on it without even reading the preview, a little too hopeful. Seeing the response, his smile faltered.  
  
_“no, you don’t have to. don’t worry about it”_  
  
Something didn’t seem right.  
  
Maybe Cross was overthinking it, since reading emotion off a text wasn’t exactly a plausible task, but regardless… something seemed wrong.  
  
_“k. talk to you later.”_  
  
Cross closed his messages, guilt washing over him. He tried to reassure himself, telling himself that all these worried feelings he was having were leftover from the game they played, but that didn’t even seem to be it.  
  
“ _ **What’s the matter, Cross? Friend troubles?**_ ” Charlie asked him almost mockingly, phasing into his vision in front of him. “ _ **Are you afraid that he’s just going to abandon you like all your other friends?**_ ”  
  
“Charlie, shut the fuck up,” Cross practically hissed. “Also, why are you calling me that.”  
  
“ _ **It’s such a charming little nickname,**_ ” Charlie replied. “ _ **Even though it makes like no sense. And gosh–PROFANITY, Cross.**_ ”  
  
“You keep calling me that and I’ll start calling you something really stupid,” Cross told him, leaning back in his chair. “No. Better plan. I’ll ask Error for a really stupid nickname for you. I’m sure he’ll come up with something great.”  
  
“ _ **Whatever,**_ ” Charlie said, flipping upside-down. “ _ **It’s not like you’ll be seeing him until the school opens again, given you don’t somehow run into him outside school. You’ll probably forget all about it by then. Speaking of school…**_ ” Cross rolled his eyes as Charlie kept talking, wondering when he was going to shut up. “ _ **It’s funny how it got blown up and it wasn’t even your fault.**_ ”  
  
“Charlie, we’ve been over this. That other high school blowing up was _not_ my fault.”  
  
“ _ **You brought the fireworks onto school grounds.**_ ”  
  
“I didn’t even know there were fireworks in that box! Freaking Dillian just told me to pick it up from his house and–”  
  
Cross closed his mouth when he heard light footsteps coming up the stairs.  
  
Surprisingly, Charlie stopped talking too, apparently distracted by something. He floated over to the window, turning his head a bit as he looked around. Cross didn’t want to be interested, but he was. He rolled his chair over, giving the ghost child a confused look. There didn’t seem to be anything particularly interesting outside.  
  
“What are you doing?” he asked.  
  
“ _ **I just sensed something really weird,**_ ” Charlie said. “ _ **Like. Really frickin’ weird.**_ ”  
  
Cross raised an eyebrow. “Because you can do that? Are you Error now?”  
  
Charlie waved his hand a bit, not looking at him. “ _ **No no no, you don’t get it. It’s almost like something just… got summoned or something. Something otherworldly.**_ ”  
  
“Great. So one of my neighbors summoned Satan. Now what,” Cross muttered, slumping back again.  
  
“ _ **Eh. I dunno. Probably isn’t that important.**_ ”  
  
“Then why are you paying attention to it?”  
  
“ _ **Sometimes people accidentally pay attention to things that end up not being important. Dimwit.**_ ” Charlie let out a huff, crossing his arms and looking back out the window.  
  
Cross rolled his eyes, spinning his chair back around and sliding back over to his computer. He opened Netflix and turned on an episode of a show he was in the process of watching. He started hearing his dad shout downstairs and promptly put on his noise-cancelling headphones.  
  
Cross wasn’t paying attention, but Charlie’s head whipped around, listening to what was happening on the first floor. Cross’s dad–aka the notorious Xavier–seemed to be on the phone with someone. And whatever it was, it wasn’t making him happy.  
  
Charlie floated over to Cross. “ _ **Cross. Cross, are you listening? … Chris!**_ ” he called. He tried to poke his host, but to little avail. He groaned, disappearing and joining with Cross’s senses again. “ _ **CHRISTOPHER MADDOX FRICKING JACKSON!**_ ”  
  
Cross jolted, throwing his headphones off.  
  
“What?!” he hissed through his teeth.  
  
“ _ **Are you even listening to what’s going on downstairs?**_ ” Charlie asked, reappearing in front of him again. “ _ **Dad is on the phone! And I heard the word custody!**_ ”  
  
“What?” Cross repeated, a little more concerned than annoyed now. “What do you mean, custody? Who is he on the phone with?”  
  
“ _ **I dunno? Mom? A lawyer? The cops??**_ ” Charlie suggested, not really certain of anything he was saying.  
  
“Charlie, if it’s important, someone will tell me later,” Cross said, putting his headphones back on. Charlie groaned, sprawling out on the floor.  
  
“ _ **Frick it. I’m going to sleep,**_ ” Charlie told him, phasing away in his position. “ _ **Being stuck to you is so unbelievably lame. I want my body back.**_ ”  
  
“You complain about this every single day,” Cross said.  
  
“ _ **Charlie is now in sleep mode. Buzz off,**_ ” he heard in his head.  
  
Cross let out a huff of air, unpausing his show.  
  
-  
-  
  
The next morning…  
  
Nevin rubbed his eyes as he headed downstairs that morning. As expected, his grandma had already left for work. With him and Drew off school, they didn’t have to wake up nearly as early, thus throwing the responsibility of making breakfast onto him. It was only practical, though.  
  
Nevin had stayed in his pajamas that morning and hadn’t even showered yet. He didn’t usually do that, but it was one of those mornings.  
  
He realized he was having a lot of ‘those mornings’ lately.  
  
Furthermore, it was one of those mornings where he wanted to make waffles for breakfast and put chocolate syrup and whipped cream on them. He didn’t even like overly sweet things, but he still wanted to do it for some reason beyond him.  
  
Nevin glanced over at the kitchen clock. Ten A.M. Whoops.  
  
At least he slept. Nevin wasn’t usually affected by things like it, but there was something so unsettling about that game he played with Cross. Something so _invasive_. It was certainly an entertaining experience, but to his astonishment, it actually managed to affect his ability to sleep to a small extent. The image of the girl staring at them from across the table, god, that was creepy. He couldn’t get it out of his head.  
  
He wondered if Cross was having similar issues.  
  
Nevin started pulling ingredients out of the cupboard, intending to make the waffles from scratch. It was the correct way, after all. Only the weak used mixes.  
  
The doorbell rang.  
  
Nevin let out a harsh exhale. Great, he had to get the door in his pajamas.  
  
He opened it. Nothing could have prepared him for what was on the other side of that door.  
  
His eyes went wide and his face twitched. There was a girl on the other side of the door, a girl with long brown hair tied in a ponytail with a white ribbon and emerald green eyes. She was smiling cheerfully enough for it to be creepy. She stood there, hands interlaced behind her back, gazing down at the shorter boy in front of her.  
  
“Uh… who are you?” Nevin asked, furrowing his brow. “Do I know you?” It wasn’t like he was going to state the connection to the girl from the game.  
  
“I’m Monika,” the brown-haired girl said nonchalantly. Even her voice sounded just like it did in the ending audio from the game.  
  
“ _Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me,_ ” Nevin thought. “Is this a joke? Go bother someone else with your stupid cosplay,” he said. “Halloween isn’t even for like a month.”  
  
“Oh, gosh. I think you’re mistaken,” the so-called Monika said. “I apologize for the early disturbance, but some girls finally freed me from my game and I thought I’d pay my most recent player a visit. I mean… I just tracked the IP of the computer it was played on. A Macbook, wasn’t it? Under the name of Jovel Laptop?”  
  
“So what if that was me? I am like this close to calling the police right now, you insane stalker,” Nevin told her, holding his fingers up at a very close distance. “Did you break into my fucking house?”  
  
Monika fidgeted a bit. “This looks really bad, doesn’t it? But I can prove it, I swear. It’s me. It’s really me! You named _him_ Chrevinstoph and you were writing for Sayori until… well…” She trailed off for a moment. Nevin was looking more disturbed as the seconds passed. “Look, I can make my face look like this.”  
  
Dark crack marks suddenly appeared on her face and her eyes turned red. They stayed like that for a few seconds before fading back to normal, bits of coding sparking over her momentarily.  
  
The realization washed over Nevin that this was either actually Monika or some crazy person who also happened to have some supernatural powers or something. Weren’t there enough of those?  
  
Nevin made a face, narrowing his eyes. His expression seemed to set the girl off a bit.  
  
“That usually scares people,” she commented.  
  
Nevin raised an eyebrow. “Oh, what?” he asked rather sarcastically. “I didn’t notice a difference.”  
  
“Excuse me? Aha…ha, that’s real funny,” Monika told him awkwardly. “I knew there was something unique about you as a player. Ha… ha.”  
  
“Oh yeah, unique,” Nevin continued. He was quiet for a moment, looking the brown-haired girl straight the eye. His eyes suddenly flashed cyan. Monika didn’t react as strongly as most people did, but she reacted to that nonetheless. “Might be the bare minimum of that. Y’know, why don’t you come in for a little bit? Since you seem _so_ desperate, and god, if you don’t have me convinced already.”  
  
He stepped backwards, holding a hand out towards the interior of his house as his eyes turned back to normal. Monika entered and he closed the door.  
  
“It’s interesting that you happen to be real,” Nevin said. “Your game really did a number on my sleep. Nothing does that.” He was almost glaring. If he was going to be honest, he had so many problems with her and her attitude in the game. It was entertaining until he considered what interacting with her in real life would be like.  
  
“Uh, thanks?” Monika answered. “Of course I’m real. Don’t you remember what I said? About how we’re the only real people, and all that?”  
  
“Sure,” Nevin muttered. “By the way, I don’t know what part of you possibly thought that coming here was a good idea after I, hmm… right, after I fricking deleted you.”  
  
Monika opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again. She took a few moments to respond, the raven-haired boy in front of her crossing his arms. “… oh. Yeah,” she said. “I, just… yeah, I thought… well. I knew while you were playing that there was just something so unique about you among all these other hazy memories of other players and I really just wanted to see and I don’t think I…”  
  
“Also, I was playing with a friend of mine, thought I’d point that out,” Nevin stated. “Wasn’t just me. And? You don’t even know my name. Nor do I intend to tell you.”  
  
“NEVIN, WHERE’S MY LAUNDRY?” Drew suddenly called down the stairs, apparently awake by then.  
  
Nevin’s eye twitched.  
  
“NO WAIT, NEVER MIND, I FOUND IT!” Drew yelled again.  
  
Nevin took a deep breath. “You know?” he started, “I need to make a call. I’ll be back in a minute or so.”  
  
He pulled out his phone, walking up the stairs. He momentarily glanced back at Monika, who honestly looked like she was going to wait like he told her to. He finished going up the stairs and called Cross. Fortunately, he picked up.  
  
“Heyyy, Nevin? What’s up?” Cross asked. “You know you can text me.”  
  
“Uh… there’s a… small emergency,” Nevin told him. “Monika is like… real. Maybe.”  
  
Cross was silent for a few long moments, standing there with his mouth open on his side of the line. “… What,” he finally said.  
  
“And she’s at my house.”  
  
Cross did not take Nevin for the kind of person to make jokes this horrible.  
  
“I’m not joking,” Nevin affirmed. “Well–either it’s actually her or some monster demon thing from hell pretending to be her. Frankly I prefer the option that it’s actually her because hell doesn’t exist.”  
  
“… Uh huh,” Cross replied. “So like, is this a ‘get your ass over here as quickly as possible’ scenario?”  
  
“Yeah, I don’t know what the hell to do.”  
  
Cross hummed, sounding fairly doubtful. “Uh… I’ll get over there as soon as I can… See you in a bit.” He hung up, quickly going to his messages and texting Ink.  
  
_“ISAAC ARE YOU GOOD FOR SHORT NOTICE”_  
  
At least Ink responded fairly quickly.  
  
_“what”_  
  
Cross was typing so fast that he made several spelling mistakes.  
  
_“nevin just texted me he said that something s going down he was all like monika is real or something and at his house and i was Kldoek WHAT yo i think re hog need help with thos”_  
  
Cross stared at the message he just sent for a moment, shaking out his hands. He picked up his phone again and wrote another message while Ink was typing.  
  
_“okay wow i was typing really fast”_  
  
Ink’s response appeared.  
  
_“yeah you don’t say I still don’t even understand what the hell is going on”_  
  
Cross let out a sigh.  
  
_“i know it’s early but can you come by as fast as you can?? i mean it’s like a potato lit dangerous supernatural thing but error isn’t involved”_  
  
_“dang autocorrect”_  
  
_“AGH AUTOCORRECT JUST CENSORED ME”_  
  
Ink’s response didn’t take long.  
  
_“potato lit? god I just laughed out loud”_  
  
_“okay keep it together C I’ll be there soon as I can”_  
  
_“try not to get murdered by monika or whatever”_  
  
Ink pocketed his phone, standing up from his desk and moving over to his closet to get his shoes. He paused for only a moment, the information finally sinking in.  
  
Monika… was real. Somehow.  
  
Maybe?  
  
As somewhat frightening as the idea sounded the more he thought about it, and even as the number of questions he had were rapidly increasing, Ink was undeniably curious.  
  
Unless Cross was messing with him, but he wouldn’t do that in this situation, right? Especially because he said that Nevin was the one who told _him_ that.  
  
All things considered, it was _really_ starting to feel like some TV series by then, with one thing happening after another… A TV series that started when he and Error officially met.  
  
As ridiculous and often irritating as it was… maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.  
  
As long as Error didn’t get involved…  
  
… right?


	12. Just a Normal Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SORRY IT TOOK SO LONG AHHHHHH
> 
> This chapter is almost three times longer than normal though, so I hope that helps.

The moment Cross rang the doorbell, Nevin practically flew down the stairs and threw the door open, fortunately changed out of his pajamas by then.  
  
“What took you so long?” he asked under his breath, since Monika was still patiently waiting in his living room. She was seated on the couch, looking around somewhat ingenuously. Nevin looked next to Cross, seeing Ink there, hands in the pockets of a blue hoodie. “Oh. He’s here too.”  
  
“I am indeed here too,” Ink said, giving a short wave.  
  
“Sorry, I was waiting outside so he’d know what house to go to,” Cross apologized. “So like… is… Monika actually here?”  
  
“Hi!” Monika chirped, leaning back in the couch just so her head was showing behind Nevin. Nevin sighed, moving out of the way, showing a clear view of her.  
  
“Whoa, she even looks real,” Ink commented, staring at the brown-haired girl as he and Cross entered. “You’re like, legitimately real? How the heck did this even happen?”  
  
“Oh, I don’t understand it much myself, but some girls in this neighborhood freed me!” Monika said. “I noticed I was in some basement, and they thought I was someone else and that their ritual or whatever failed. I saw my reflection later and realized that I did look like someone else!” She laughed. It sounded exactly like the three boys expected it to. “I had all this muscle memory too, it was so weird. I just followed it back to the house of whoever I was and pretended to be her. But when I woke up the next morning, I looked like me again, so that was a relief.”  
  
Cross and Nevin glanced at each other, concerned looks in their eyes, and similar thoughts running through their minds. Ink didn’t really seem to care, though.  
  
“So how’d you get here?” Ink asked.  
  
“I tracked the IP of the last computer it was played on!” Monika answered cheerily. “And that was… um… Nevin’s computer! I think.”  
  
“Don’t say my name out loud, you code hoe,” Nevin grumbled. Cross choked.  
  
Monika didn’t seem to hear him. “He said that he played with a friend. Which one of you was it? I’m awfully curious.”  
  
“It was him,” Ink said, pointing to Cross. “I was the one who recommended him the game.”  
  
Nevin put his fingers to his brow for a moment. “Listen–Isaac. We’re not here to make small talk. Monika, uh…” He looked at her for a second. “I appreciate the thought of you coming by and all that but can you maybe come back another time? We have to… uh… work on a project. For school.”  
  
Ink and Cross simultaneously raised eyebrows and subsequently made eye contact.  
  
“Yeah! Uh. You met us. Now… go do real world things, since you’re not stuck in a game anymore,” Nevin continued.  
  
“But I can help you!” Monika said. “Do you need help?”  
  
“No, _god_ , no we don’t,” Nevin told her.  
  
Monika looked around awkwardly for a moment. “Well, um… okay then. I guess I’ll come back later!” She stood up, still smiling, but looking unsure. “I’ll buy something for you, okay?”  
  
“Yeah, um… sure, you do that,” Nevin said, standing next to the open front door. She walked out, and he immediately closed the door behind her and locked it. He looked at Ink and Cross, who were still looking reasonably confused. “Okay. What the fuck do we do?”  
  
“You kicked her out so fast,” Ink stated. “I kinda had some questions I wanted to ask.”  
  
“And I have a brother I don’t want getting involved in this at all,” Nevin replied. “Look, we need to work together to figure out how to get rid of her.”  
  
“Oh yeah, after she said that she basically took over someone I was like, yeah, is she like some kind of demon? Because that’s what it sounded like,” Cross mentioned. “And what, a ritual? This is starting to sound like an episode of Buffy or something.”  
  
“… Yeah, exactly,” Nevin said, crossing his arms as his gaze drifted down. He seemed spaced out for a second, but his eyes shot back up quickly. “Do either of you have any ideas?”  
  
“I’d say look for the people who summoned her, that’s a start,” Ink suggested.  
  
Suddenly, his phone emitted a jingle, indicating a new text. Which was weird, because Cross was the only one who ever texted him and he was standing right next to him. Ink pulled out his phone, seeing a text from an unidentified number.  
  
_“Sorry for the bother, but Error is wondering what you’re up to and you blocked his number. -Barry”_  
  
“Are you kidding me right now?” Ink muttered.  
  
It buzzed again. Nevin furrowed his brow in front of him, looking a little irritated attention was being drawn away from the problem at hand.  
  
_“He saw you and Chris Jackson walk into the house that he presumes is the Jovel house, and a girl he didn’t recognize walk out…”_  
  
“What is it?” Cross asked Ink.  
  
“Fricking Error,” the shorter boy grumbled. “I can’t catch a break. Ever! God, I bet he is literally outside watching from a goddamn bush with a pair of binoculars, because he doesn’t have anything better to do with his time. I don’t know why he would be here, and why he would care so much as to text his friend to text me to…”  
  
“Okay Isaac, it’s gonna be all right,” Cross told him, putting a hand on his arm. “If he’s out there, he’ll probably lose interest really fast.”  
  
Nevin let out a huff of air. “Yeah, like he would walk up after I beat the shit out of him,” he mumbled.  
  
“Wait, you beat up _Error_?” Cross asked. “Wait. WAIT. Your bruises. YOU BEAT UP ERROR?”  
  
Ink looked just as surprised. He promptly started connecting the dots between this and the call he had received a couple days earlier.  
  
Nevin glanced around nervously. “Um… uh… shit,” he cursed under his breath. “Don’t yell. Okay? You literally cannot tell anyone. No, nobody is supposed to know that we even _interacted_ that day. Frankly he would probably agree. But that’s beside the point.”  
  
“Dude, how did you do it?” Cross asked him. “He’s like…”  
  
Cross suddenly had a flashback to the unusually large amount of force Nevin seemed to exert without trying on a regular basis.  
  
“… ohhhh, oh I get it,” Cross said. “Whoaaaa. I get it. It all makes sense now. I think.”  
  
“I’m really confused right now,” Ink stated.  
  
“I think Nevin has some kind of–” Cross started, but he cut himself off, seeing the look on Nevin’s face. “I mean… he used his powers. That’s why it’s a secret, I guess.”  
  
Ink looked over at Nevin. “What even are they, anyway?” he asked.  
  
“Can we not talk about this right now?” Nevin suggested, sounding impatient. “We have to–I dunno–stop a demonic anime girl from fricking something up. We’re going to go find the ones responsible for this.”  
  
“Why didn’t we ask Monika exactly where she came from? She probably would’ve told us,” Ink stated.  
  
“She can’t be that stupid, Isaac,” Cross told him.  
  
“Dude. She fell in love with the player, whom she knows nothing about whatsoever, and destroyed everything she knew for said player,” Ink replied. “As dramatic and Disney as that sounds, it was…  _really_ stupid. She’s all like, ‘oh, I’m beyond my programming!’ but literally does not realize that she was programmed to do that.”  
  
“But if she’s real, what if she _wasn’t_? What if Doki Doki Literature Club actually is something straight out of a creepypasta?”  
  
Ink held up a finger. “She could be real and programmed.”  
  
“Do you two have any ideas of where to start?” Nevin asked them, attempting to turn the discussion back in the right direction. “Who would do something like this?”  
  
“Well, it must have been on purpose… so it’s probably someone who played the game recently,” Ink suggested. “I think it’s a safe bet to say it was someone in our school, knowing our luck. Only a high schooler would be dumb enough to try and summon an anime girl.”  
  
“Okay, so we’ve hopefully narrowed it down to our school,” Nevin said.  
  
“… but that’s still a ton of ground,” Cross commented. “We’re all nerds with minimal social lives. We’d have to ask someone for help who has information like that, who knows lots of people…”  
  
They were all quiet for a few moments.  
  
“We’re not asking Error,” Ink said quickly.  
  
“Oh, god no,” Nevin told him. “We could ask literally anyone else and it would be better.”  
  
Ink thought for a second. “Actually… his _friend_ might know some stuff. He seemed really shady when I first talked to him, so I have this impression that he knows things. And currently, he seems to be Error’s method of distant communication since I blocked his number.”  
  
“Who’s to say he’s going to help us? If he’s friends with Quinton then he’s obviously sided with him.”  
  
“Pff, I almost forgot his last name was Quinton,” Cross stated.  
  
“I don’t know,” Ink said. “He didn’t seem very sided. He seemed more like someone who ended up being patient enough to deal with him, rather than someone who’s dumb enough to do whatever he says.” He held up his phone again. “That was actually him who texted me just now, so I guess we could try and ask him…”  
  
“What reason does he have to help us?” Nevin asked.  
  
Ink shrugged. “What reason do we have to not try? The sooner we can take care of this, the better. We don’t have any other ideas, do we?”  
  
“I don’t think we do,” Cross commented.  
  
Nevin let out a huff of air. “Fine. I guess we don’t have any other options,” he said.  
  
Ink took a short breath before he opened up his messages again and started texting Blueberry.  
  
_“uh, hi. we actually have a problem on our hands and need a small amount of help from someone who is preferably not error.”_  
  
The three of them waited in anticipation for a response. A read sign appeared, soon followed by the icon of a message being typed.  
  
_“Oh really? What’s the matter?”_  
  
“All right, here we go,” Cross said, rubbing his hands together. Nevin shushed him aggressively for no reason.  
  
“Guys, how am I supposed to word this?” Ink asked. “You can’t just say…  _who would be most likely to summon a demonic anime girl_. Especially because Error will not have it if we talk about supernatural things with people who don’t have any connection to it or whatever.”  
  
“What does it matter? It’s not like you’re telling him that we all have weird powers,” Nevin told him.  
  
Ink let out a hum and hesitantly started typing again.  
  
_“is there anyone in the school who’s like… really weird. like, someone who would probably try and do a summoning ritual.”_  
  
The response took a little while.  
  
_“What kind of summoning ritual?”_  
  
Ink looked over at Cross for a moment, who shrugged in response.  
  
_“I dunno, one that like… summons an anime girl or something. or just a fictional character in general I guess”_  
  
_“Hmm. I think I may know someone like that.”_  
  
“This guy is really shady,” Nevin commented.  
  
“How could he be so chill about this?” Cross wondered.  
  
“Well, he is Error’s friend,” Ink said. “Maybe he actually knows stuff and isn’t totally unaware.”  
  
Another text came up.  
  
_“I can’t help but think of Desiree Gonzalez. She’s the leader of a certain clique and has… odd interests. Error knows her better than me, though.”_  
  
"Of course he does,” Ink grumbled.  
  
_“I mean, if he’s close by, you might as well ask him. I don’t know how close by he is, but if he’s close enough to make an observation like the one he did, he’s probably at a convenient distance.”_  
  
Ink furrowed his brow.  
  
_“yeah right. thanks for the help I guess”_  
  
Another message came in response.  
  
_“I just want to let you know that this was a free trial. :)”_  
  
The trio blinked.  
  
_“Adios, Isaac.”_  
  
“God, I got chills,” Cross said. “Why do I have chills? Is he really that shady? Man, I don’t even know him!”  
  
“Do we really have to ask Error about this?” Ink asked with a sigh. “Can’t we just like… do some internet stalking and hope that this person stuck her address on social media or something?”  
  
“Certainly sounds like a better option,” Nevin said. “I’m gonna go get my computer.” He darted upstairs, leaving Cross and Ink alone for a bit.  
  
Ink peeked out the window through the closed shades. His brow furrowed as he noticed Error sitting on a bench across the street, looking at his phone. His gaze rose momentarily to the house, and seeing the eyes on him from the window, he dove behind a random tree.  
  
He was truly a master at being unsuspecting.  
  
“Chris, he’s there,” Ink stated. “He’s actually fricking there. Why does he have no life.”  
  
“Love is probably just the most important thing to him,” Cross answered, looking down at his phone. Ink’s head whipped around.  
  
“ _No_ ,” he declared.  
  
Cross snickered. “Yo man, look at this picture,” he said, holding up his phone to Ink. “Error was taking a selfie with a couple of his friends and you’re way in the background just _glaring_ at him. I don’t think he even realized you were there.”  
  
Ink squinted at the picture being shown to him. “… Why are you friends with Error on Facebook?” he asked somewhat flatly.  
  
“He sent it first,” Cross answered with a shrug.  
  
Nevin returned from the top of the stairs, carrying a laptop covered in various stickers. “Here, I got it,” he said, plopping down on the couch and opening it. Ink and Cross peered over his shoulders behind him, watching him as he opened an internet browser and typed in the site. “God, if I’m going to be honest, I hate Facebook. It’s such a horribly designed site.”  
  
“The lack of chronology drives me nuts personally,” Ink said. “It has this wonky, oversensitive algorithm and it’s always trying to sell you stuff. So yeah, that’s why I deleted mine.”  
  
“Do you use any social media?” Cross asked.  
  
Ink shrugged. “Does Tumblr count? I have a blog dedicated entirely to cursed memes and pictures that I’ve ruined through editing. Oh, and uh… art or something.”  
  
Cross snickered. “Man, I would follow you but I don’t use Tumblr,” he said.  
  
“Probably for the best.”  
  
“All right, I’m looking through Quinton’s friend list,” Nevin stated, staring intently at the screen in front of him. “Chances are he’s friended with this girl, right?”  
  
“Oh, there,” Cross replied almost immediately, pointing at a place on the screen. The girl’s profile picture featured an over-filtered selfie in which she was making a duck face, blatantly accentuating glittery lip gloss. Her long brown hair was jagged and curly, pieces of it bleached blonde and other pieces dyed red, and her darker-toned face was clearly caked in make-up.  
  
Nevin clicked on Desiree Gonzalez’s profile, bringing them to a page that immediately assaulted them with posts filled with emojis. It looked like she posted on a regular basis and many of those posts were selfies accompanied with irrelevant status messages. Perhaps the only redeeming quality of the page was the photographer-quality header that was her posing on the roof of a building in front of a sunset with whom they presumed were her friends.  
  
“This is physically painful,” Nevin grumbled.  
  
“I mean, she’s kinda pretty, isn’t she?” Cross asked.  
  
Nevin and Isaac both looked over at him.  
  
“… I’m just making an observation.”  
  
Nevin rose an eyebrow before turning his attention back to the screen and clicking on the page’s ‘about’ section. Most of the information was private, only revealing basic details and short descriptions that didn’t prove much help. There wasn’t any contact information open to public, and there weren’t any family members listed to try to contact.  
  
“God dammit,” Nevin grumbled. “Now what.”  
  
“I mean, we could just… ask Error,” Cross said. Isaac and Nevin both narrowed their eyes at him. “Or I could?”  
  
“Chris, this is a supernatural thing, this is the very thing we _don’t_ want to involve him in,” Isaac told him with a sigh.  
  
“But we don’t have any other options! That are like… y’know, legal. If he knows her this could go a lot faster if we just ask him.”  
  
“And what reason does he have to help?” Nevin asked. “Like he would do anything but laugh in our faces over the fact that we need help?”  
Ink was quiet for a few moments. “… Actually, he gets way too excited about supernatural things. He might do that, but only for like a minute or so.” He let out a huff of air. “Y’know, whatever. If it makes this easier, let’s go for it. I’m gonna give him a piece of my mind for being so fucking weird.”  
  
“Well, good luck with that,” Nevin said, sinking more into the couch. “As long as I don’t have to interact with him.”  
  
“We’ll be back,” Cross told him dramatically.  
  
Cross and Ink exited the house, Cross saluting towards Nevin jokingly as they left. They walked out onto the porch, Ink taking a deep breath and he brought his attention back to the spot where he had seen Error earlier.  
  
He briefly peeked out from behind the tree, and seeing Cross and Ink coming towards him from across the street, leaped up to bolt away.  
  
“STAY,” Ink yelled out, pointing towards him and picking up the pace. Error froze in his running position, turning his head towards him.  
  
“Heyyyy how’s it going,” Error said awkwardly. “I was… I was just passing through.”  
  
“The hell you were!” Ink shouted, still storming towards him with an accusatory finger. “Do I have to place a restraining order on you or something?!”  
  
“I live like one street away from here!” Error insisted. “By no means does this qualify as stalking! I’m minding my own goddamn business!”  
  
Cross hemmed very loudly. Ink glanced over at him, furrowing his brow, before rolling his eyes and looking away again. Error raised an eyebrow in confusion.  
  
“We have something to ask you, actually,” Cross said. “Don’t we, Isaac?”  
  
Ink let out a loud sigh. “… Yes, yes we do,” he answered. “Aside from anything your ability mind your own business.”  
  
“I was minding my own business!” Error declared.  
  
“Listen,” Cross started, “Your knowledge on current indie games aside, someone mysteriously summoned a self-aware anime girl who took over someone’s body…”  
  
Error’s expression changed visibly. “Supernatural?” he asked.  
  
“… and we’re trying to figure out who did it. Our only lead is the possibility that it was this girl you apparently know.”  
  
Error raised an eyebrow… again. “And who told you this?”  
  
“Your friend Barry was texting me,” Ink told him. “Which I’m pretty sure you instigated.”  
  
“… Of course he did,” Error said, almost groaning. “Yeah, he doesn’t take sides. Anyway, who. Who’s the lead.”  
  
“Uh… Desiree Gonzalez?” Cross asked.  
  
Error scoffed. “Oh my god, are you serious? I can’t believe she actually succeeded in summoning something this time. Well, hypothetically. So like, was that girl that walked out of the house a few minutes ago this supposed anime girl?”  
  
“Yes, and Nevin and Chris are very adamant about getting rid of her,” Ink commented, crossing his arms.  
  
“Well if she took over someone’s body we should probably do that,” Error told him like it was obvious. “Who’d it even happen to?”  
  
“I dunno, she was being nondescript,” Cross said. “Anyway, you know the lead, right?”  
  
“Yeah, she’s literally lived right next to me since we were in middle school,” Error replied. He pulled out his phone. “I guess I can call her or something.” He let out a long exhale as he called the number, which he seemed to have saved in his favorites.  
  
The girl almost picked up immediately. “Hey hey! What’s up, chump?” she asked.  
  
“Dez, did you try to summon something again?” Error asked her.  
  
“…… Maybe,” she replied. “Man, what do you know.”  
  
“Based on…” Error looked over at Ink, who was narrowing his eyes at him. “… unspecified sources, I’m pretty sure it worked this time.”  
  
“OH MY GOD IT WORKED?!” Dez yelled into the phone loud enough to be clearly heard. Error held the phone away from his face momentarily. “WHERE’S MY WIFE!”  
  
Ink and Cross looked at each other, the same expression on their faces.  
  
“I don’t know!” Error answered. “You know what, we actually need to talk in person. Are you at home?”  
  
“Uh, yeah?” Dez replied.  
  
“Good. We’re coming over, don’t go anywhere.”  
  
“We’re–?”  
  
Error hung up and pocketed his phone.  
  
“We’re?” Ink repeated the question.  
  
“Yes, we’re. Dez lives like two minutes away from here. We’re going,” Error told him. “You know more about this than I do, apparently.”  
  
-  
-  
  
A two minute walk later…  
  
Error knocked on the door of the average-sized house. It immediately flew open, the girl portrayed on the social media page standing behind it, shorter than all three of them. The only difference was that she wasn’t wearing make-up and she didn’t have any red in her hair. It must have been an older picture.  
  
“ERROR GIVE ME DETAILS,” she demanded. She stopped, looking behind him to see Ink and Cross. “Oh. Boy. I know you’re always hanging with people but you didn’t tell me about this.”  
  
“We were on the phone for like twenty seconds,” Error told her.  
  
“Wait a second,” she started. She pointed at the two behind him. “Why do I feel like I recognize you guys? But like, not familiarly.” She made a face like she was scanning Ink. “You look like, super familiar and I don’t know why.”  
  
“Doesn’t matter,” Ink said.  
  
“ _Does not_ matter,” Error affirmed on top of him. “So, Dez. Questions. How did this happen. This whole summoning thing.”  
  
“You know, the usual,” Dez told him. “I found a really shady website with the ritual instructions on it. I think the only reason it worked was because of how specific they were! My friends were all there with me and we thought it didn’t work so it was really sad but it worked and I WANT TO KNOW WHERE MONIKA IS!” She grabbed Error by his jacket and started shaking him.  
  
“DEZ BE CALM,” Error told her, patting her head. “CALM.”  
  
“I CAN’T CALM!!” she cried, letting go of him and putting her head against the door frame. She almost immediately jumped back up and stepped outside the house. “Can’t you tell me where she is?!”  
  
“I don’t know, I didn’t see her! It was them!” Error replied, referring to Ink and Cross. He moved out of the way, leaving them to Dez’s fury.  
  
“TELL ME WHERE MY WIFE WENT,” she demanded.  
  
“Shopping! Somewhere!” Cross told her. “Look, she came over and she was being really creepy so we had to send her away for a while to try and figure out what to do!”  
  
“You. Sent her away,” Dez said. She took a deep breath through her teeth, and breathed out while stepping backwards. “God, I’m gonna fucking cry. ERROR, I’M GONNA CRY.” She grabbed Error again, basically forcing a hug as she buried her face in his sports jacket.  
  
Error looked at Cross and Ink, biting his lip slightly. They were both giving him a look, like he should do something.  
  
“Um, Dez. There’s something I need to ask,” Error said. “And it’s really serious, all right?”  
  
“What,” Dez mumbled into his coat.  
  
“This uh… person you summoned. You didn’t just summon her. She apparently took over someone’s body. And we should probably reverse that.”  
  
Dez backed away from him, looking up at him with an evident frown. “Oh come on, I don’t even get to meet her? This is not even fair. I finally succeeded and we have to undo it? Laaaaame.”  
  
Ink crossed his arms. “Maybe take into consideration that Monika went straight to someone else’s house after being summoned,” he said. “Thanks to them being the most recent players.”  
  
“What?” Dez asked. “That’s so dumb.”  
  
“And frankly?” Ink continued, putting his hands in his pockets. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s still _hopelessly_ in love with a certain someone.”  
  
“You know, I’m suddenly getting this impression that I’m missing some of the information,” Error stated. “Can someone explain to me what is actually happening. Like, who the hell actually is Monika.”  
  
Dez breathed aggressively. “HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW,” she practically yelled.  
  
“He’s a jock, he doesn’t know shit about internet trends,” Ink said. Error shot a glare at him.  
  
“Wait, it’s already an internet trend?” Cross asked. “Man, I didn’t even know that.”  
  
“Error. My dude. You have to play Doki Doki Literature Club, even if you don’t know anything about anime tropes,” Dez said.  
  
“No,” Ink muttered almost inaudibly, shaking his head. “No, you don’t…”  
  
“Um, _excuse me_ ,” Error started, holding up a finger. “I think you’re jumping to conclusions. I might not have as much time to spend in the dark corners of the internet as you nerds but I am not ignorant in internet trends.”  
  
“Quote a vine,” Ink told him.  
  
“I WON’T HESITATE, BITCH!” Error shouted much louder than necessary, holding his hands up in a finger gun.  
  
“God dammit,” Ink grumbled. “Whatever. Monika is a character from an anime-inspired dating sim visual novel except it’s almost a parody because it’s actually a psychological horror game. It’s a party. And I really don’t want it to be ruined for me by you playing it and talking about it.”  
  
“Really,” Error responded. “And I don’t recall caring about how you feel about things. So like, oops.”  
  
“I’m getting this distinct impression that you guys hate each other,” Dez commented. “How exactly did we get here?”  
  
“Not important,” Ink and Error answered at the same time. They glared at each other.  
  
Dez’s eyes narrowed in confusion as she looked away momentarily. “Uh… you know, I’m just gonna go grab the webpage I found the ritual on.” She pulled out her phone. “I guess it’s a good thing I saved it…” She looked back up at Error. “But hey. We are not allowed to do shit until I meet my wife.”  
  
“You say that like it’s so set in stone,” Ink said. “Like, god. What if she ends up being a terrible spouse. Don’t marry someone you just met. Didn’t you learn anything from Frozen?”  
  
“Sayori is better,” Cross randomly added.  
  
Ink and Dez slowly looked at him.  
  
“Gosh, who’s that?” Ink asked, a smile twitching on his face.  
  
“Just Monika,” Dez told him, a grin spreading on her face. “Just Monika…”  
  
“Oh, fuck off,” Cross grumbled.  
  
“I feel really excluded from this conversation,” Error stated.  
  
“Good for you,” Ink replied.  
  
“Here, here’s the page,” Dez said. “Revocation instructions.” She let out a huff of air. She turned slightly, showing them the screen of her phone. The three boys crowded around her. “To revoke your summoning of the Wife Queen, do not destroy the computer right away or you’re fucked. I mean, that’s what it says. Nothing terrible has happened to the computer, so that’s good.”  
  
Ink sniggered. “Pff, wife queen.”  
  
“Monika’s presence in the world is powered by her undying love for the player…” Dez continued, her eyes narrowing as she read it. “Her summoning can only be terminated by shattering her love, and _then_ destroying the computer she was summoned with.”  
  
“Holy hell, do you think she’s actually in love with Nevin?” Cross asked. “No wonder he’s acting so uncomfortable.”  
  
“Wait, this fricked up anime girl is in love with the emo kid?” Error questioned. “My god.” He snickered. “Let him suffer.”  
  
“Well that’s not even fair,” Dez grumbled. “You know what, fuck it. Let’s unsummon this anime bitch.”  
  
“That was a quick change of heart,” Ink said. “Not even worried about your computer?”  
  
Dez shrugged. “Hey, I took necessary precautions and used a friend’s really old laptop that we were going to drop off a building anyway. Like, guys. It was a Dell.” She grabbed a pair of sandals from next to the door and put them on. “So, what say we find this hoe?”  
  
“Wouldn’t it be better to just wait for her to come back to Nevin’s house?” Cross suggested. “Because she probably will.”  
  
“That’ll take too long,” Error said, crossing his arms. “You guys can do that, me and Dez are going to go drive around and look.”  
  
“Yay, adventure,” Dez cheered halfheartedly. “Also Error, that’s incorrect grammar.”  
  
Error rolled his eyes. “Leave me alone.”  
  
Dez jumped back into her house, holding up a finger as she ran into another room. “Let me go get my car keys,” she called from inside.  
  
“DO WE HAVE TO TAKE YOUR CAR?” Error yelled into the house.  
  
“IT’S LITERALLY RIGHT HERE, YOU DORK!” Dez yelled back. “WE’RE NOT WALKING TO YOUR HOUSE FOR NO REASON!”  
  
Error groaned loudly.  
  
“I’m surprised you have normal friends,” Ink stated. “Very loosely using the word normal, though.”  
  
“Shut up, nerd,” Error replied. “Go back to the emo kid’s house or something before I push you off the porch stairs.”  
  
“God, so aggressive.” Ink hopped off the porch, Cross following suit.  
  
Ink shoved his hands back in his pockets, slowing his pace for Cross to catch up with him. He turned his head to see Error still glaring at him from the distance, but he whipped his attention away the moment he noticed Ink looking at him.  
  
“I kind of hate the fact that this all happened to work out,” Ink said. “Why was asking Error for help the solution? It’s almost infuriating.”  
  
“At least we have a solution,” Cross told him.  
  
Ink kicked a rock on the ground. “I know. It’s just dumb.” He let out an amused huff. “I’m just surprised that Error has a lesbian friend.”  
  
“Or maybe just bi with a huge crush on Monika?” Cross suggested.  
  
“Nah, man. Definitely a lesbian. Did you even look at her shirt?”  
  
Cross raised an eyebrow. “What?”  
  
“It literally said ‘winks at the ladies’. Also, there was an axe on the back. That’s on the lesbian pride flag.”  
  
“… Oh. Half the time I don’t even notice what people’s shirts say.”  
  
Ink laughed a little. “Clearly.”

-  
-

They knocked on Nevin’s door once they arrived there again and he promptly opened it up.  
  
“Hey. What was that about?” he asked. “I saw you guys go off with Quinton somewhere and it was really confusing.”  
  
“Oh, turns out everything was right and we went straight to the house of the girl who summoned Monika and now we know how to get rid of her,” Cross told him. “It was peachy.”  
  
“Wow, that’s convenient,” Nevin replied. “So? How do we do it?”  
  
“She and Error went off to go find Monika,” Ink said. “In case she doesn’t come back here fast enough. Apparently, in order to get rid of her, you have to extinguish her love and destroy the computer she was summoned from.”  
  
“… Extinguish her love,” Nevin repeated. “What the hell does that mean.”  
  
Ink shrugged. “Make her stop loving you?”  
  
Nevin grimaced. “Wait, who the hell said she loved me?” he asked. “I mean, I was cringing at potential signs, but…  _why_.”  
  
“I guess because it was your computer,” Cross said. “I guess all we can do now though is wait for her to come back or for Error to find her. It could be a while.”  
  
“Man. What are we supposed to do until then?” Nevin wondered. “Wait?”

-  
-

MEANWHILE…  
  
“ERROR! ERROR I SEE HER!” Dez shouted. Error practically screamed as she swerved to the side of the road and stopped next to a fire hydrant.  
  
Monika stopped where she was, staring at the car that had so violently pulled up. The window rolled down, Dez lowering the sunglasses that she was now wearing and looking at her from her spot in the driver’s seat.  
  
“Can I help you?” Monika asked.  
  
“Hey Monika,” Dez greeted. “I’m with the les-league. And bitch, you in trouble.”  
  
Monika looked away, then looked back, raising an eyebrow. “Do I know you?”  
  
“Don’t play dumb with me, woman. I summoned you,” Dez told her. “Also, a bunch of people I think were nerds were looking for you, wanting you to come back. They’ve got something for you.”  
  
“I thought they were working on a school project,” Monika replied.  
  
Dez shrugged. “I dunno? What harm is there in walking back. Besides, don’t you wanna see your _true love_ above all else?” She said the last bit in a mocking tone. “He wants to see you. Not that I actually know who he is but that’s beside the point.”  
  
Error simply observed from his position in the passenger seat, rolling his eyes here and there at Dez’s attitude.  
  
“My message has been delivered,” Dez declared. “I’m out.” She rolled the window back up and drove off in the direction they came in. “Error. Can you let those other guys know about this or what?”  
  
“… I sort of lack the contact information for that,” Error answered.  
  
“Oh, great,” Dez grumbled. “Whatever, I guess we’ll just drive over there. Which house is it?”  
  
“… The brown one with the white porch, I think?”  
  
Dez sighed. “You know, just point to it when you see it.”  
  
When they arrived, Ink was already waiting on the porch, sitting on the bench swing with his legs crossed. Seeing them pull up, a look of confusion rose on his face. Error didn’t even bother getting out of Dez’s car, instead rolling down the window and yelling at him.  
  
“HEY. WE FOUND HER AND SHE’S PROBABLY ON HER WAY HERE,” Error said much louder than necessary. “I would’ve called you but _someone_ blocked my damn number!”  
  
“Why not call Chris, you dick?” Ink asked, standing up and walking to the other side of the porch next to the driveway.  
  
“Don’t have his number.”  
  
“Hey Error. You might want to get out of the car,” Dez said, tapping him on the shoulder. “I just remembered I should probably go grab that shitty laptop so I have to drive back to my house.”  
  
“Right, sure,” Error replied, getting out and putting his hands in his pockets. Dez practically shot out of the driveway and zoomed off. “… I have no idea why I agreed to do that when being here is literally no better.”  
  
“What a mystery,” Ink answered, now looking at his phone.  
  
Dez drove back about five minutes later. Everyone sat around for a while, waiting for Monika to get back, which took about another five minutes. Ink knocked on Nevin’s door, him and Cross opening it up and meeting her out in the yard. Dez watched bitterly from her car, Error now in the passenger seat again due to the lack of desire to stand for that long. Nevin shot a glare at Error the moment he watched outside, as if offended by his existence. Error glared back from the open doors of the car.  
  
Monika looked around, still trying to figure out what was going on.  
  
“Look Monika, there’s something we really need to talk about,” Nevin started, turning his attention back to her. “I need you to tell me something.”  
“Well–of… course?” Monika stammered slightly. “Anything?”  
  
“Here, let’s just talk about this inside,” he said. Ink and Cross glanced at him, but he nodded, and they just looked at each other and shrugged. Monika followed Nevin inside, Nevin closing the door behind him. “Why are you here? Really?” he asked her.  
  
“What?” Monika asked. “Because… You know…” She took a deep breath. “I’m not over you. Even after everything. I’m not.”  
  
Nevin narrowed his eyes.  
  
“You don’t know anything about me,” he said.  
  
“… But… there’s something. I can tell,” Monika told him. “It’s kind of dumb, but I’ve never felt anything like this. After spending so much time stuck there, knowing that nothing is real. And then, suddenly everything _is_ real. It’s right in front of me. And… you’re real. It’s astonishing, that this could finally happen, and…”  
  
Monika raised a hand up towards him, but put it back down when Nevin’s eyes flashed.  
  
“You know that’s not going to work,” he said. “You don’t even realize how stupid and unreasonable you’re being.”  
  
“I don’t care. This is speaking to me stronger than anything ever has.” In spite of Nevin’s reactions, she took his hand. “I love you. I still love you. I shouldn’t, but I do.”  
  
Nevin took a deep breath and let it out, rolling his eyes.  
  
“Monika, I’m gay,” he said.  
  
Monika paused, still holding onto his hand.  
  
“… What,” she choked out.  
  
“Also Sayori is way better than you, you deplorable psychopath,” Nevin added, his mouth rising into a smirk. “Go back to hell where you probably came from.”  
  
Monika dropped his hand, her fingers twitching.  
  
“Wh–What–?” she stammered. “God, could you be any more brutal? You could’ve just stopped at the gay part!”  
  
“I could’ve,” Nevin replied, “but why? You’re a terrible person and I want to have nothing to do with you.”  
  
Monika backed away slightly, tears forming at the corners of her eyes as her breath grew unstable. Her hands started to twitch more violently as her eyes grew wider, turning red as her face slowly started to take on its cracked appearance again. If Nevin’s eyes didn’t deceive him, glitches were darting over her.  
  
“What’s the matter, are you going to throw a temper tantrum?” Nevin asked her. “Please, do it outside.”  
  
“You… you’re a piece of shit, you know that?” Monika hissed, an unnatural growl present in her voice now.  
  
Nevin crossed his arms. “You might want to take a lot at yourself first. Also, I’m serious about the temper tantrum thing in my house. We’re going outside if you’re doing this.”  
  
Nevin grabbed her by her jacket, throwing the front door open again and dragging her outside. Monika struggled to no avail before being thrown onto the floor of the porch. Cross and Ink stared from where they were near them.  
  
“So, let’s go over this again, Monika,” Nevin said. “You’re going to learn from this that people are not always as they seem.”  
  
Monika grunted angrily, rising to her feet. “ **Well, me neither** ,” she said, her voice almost echoing. Hearing this, Error and Dez leapt out of the car to see what was happening. Monika backed off the porch, the dark cracks starting to cover her whole body as glitches sparked across her violently.  
  
… Then she started floating in the air.  
  
“Holy shit,” Ink said. “What the actual hell is happening?”  
  
“ **I never should’ve fallen in love with you,** ” Monika declared, pointing at Nevin. “ **Now I see you for who you really are, and you’re nothing like the one I fell in love with!** ”  
  
Monika’s hands sparked violently as she abruptly straightened them, the ground where Nevin was standing suddenly glitching with a loud static noise. Nevin jumped out of the way towards Ink and Cross, barely avoiding whatever that was.  
  
“Good for you, you vindictive maniac!” Nevin yelled back at her.  
  
“Dez. Dez, laptop,” Error said, starting to nudge the girl next to him.  
  
“Wait, I need to take a picture!” Dez insisted, pulling out her phone.  
  
Error groaned. “We don’t have time for that! Get the laptop!”  
  
“Okay, okay, god,” Dez answered, going back to her car and quickly opening up the backseat to get the computer. She grabbed it, bolting back out next to Error. “Care to do the honors?”  
  
“Sure, whatever,” Error replied, taking the computer and throwing it on the ground.  
  
Monika’s entire body became unstable for a moment as he did so. Her head whipped around, staring at them. “ **No, no, no! Don’t you dare do that!** ” she shouted. She zoomed towards them, Error and Dez both emitting high-pitched noises as they ducked out of the way.  
  
“GIVE ME THAT!” Nevin yelled. Error picked up the computer and threw it at him rather violently. Nevin just so happened to catch it. “THANKS, ASSHOLE.”  
  
“NO PROBLEM, YOU EMO PIECE OF SHIT,” Error retorted.  
  
Nevin flipped him off before taking the computer with both of his hands. Monika spun around from her position in the air, noticing that he now had it.  
  
“ **NO!** ” Monika screamed. Nevin lifted up one of his knees, his eyes momentarily flashing cyan as he broke the laptop over his leg.  
  
Monika started screaming so much to the point where everyone covered their ears. The cracks covering her became thicker and thicker until she fell to the ground, glitches spewing from her into the sky and disappearing, leaving behind the unconscious body of the girl who had originally been affected.  
  
Everyone was quiet.  
  
“… Oh my god,” Cross said, slowly uncovering his ears. “That was fucking awesome.”  
  
“Rest in pieces, wife queen,” Dez spoke, shaking her head. She came a bit closer, looking up at the sky where the glitches from Monika had vanished into. She then looked at the ground, noticing the girl near her feet already. “Oh shit, Rachel! Wake up!” She grabbed Rachel by the shoulders and started to shake her.  
  
“Should we call an ambulance?” Ink wondered, approaching Dez.  
  
Rachel started to stir. “Nnn… what happened?” she asked. “Dez, why are you holding me like this…? I told you I’m straight…”  
  
“We’re probably fine,” Dez told Ink.  
  
Nevin briefly looked at the pieces of computer in his hand. Then he looked back at Error, then back at the computer scraps.  
  
“I fucking dare you to throw those at me,” Error told him, glaring.  
  
There was only a split second between Error saying that and Nevin hurling the pieces at him. Error yelped as he ducked, the pieces flying right over his head and hitting a tree right outside Cross’s house so hard that it left a significant dent in the bark.  
  
“If you’ll excuse me, I have some fucking waffles to make,” Nevin announced, walking back towards his house. He stopped in front of Ink and Cross. “Oh, and uh… thanks for helping.”  
  
“No problem, man,” Cross asked, smiling with a bit of uncertainty. Nevin walked back into his house, closing the door behind him.  
  
There were a few seconds of silence.  
  
“Well, I’m going home,” Dez said, going over to pick up the broken pieces of the laptop before heading back to her car. “I’m gonna see how much more I can mutilate these computer pieces. Error, do you want me to drive you over to your house?”  
  
“… Sure,” he answered, following her back to her car. They got in and promptly drove away, leaving the other two boys behind.  
  
“… well. That was an interesting morning,” Ink commented.  
  
“Hey, um… Isaac?” Cross started. “Do you want to hang out today? Since that didn’t happen the other day and all.”  
  
“Oh, uh, sure,” Ink replied. “Yeah, that’d be sweet. You want to come over and chill or something?”  
  
Cross smiled. “Sounds good.”


	13. Free Cookies

Breakfast was awkwardly quiet. The twins both felt the clear necessity to discuss a few things, but neither of them dared to say a word. Nevin was shoving waffles in his mouth, attempting to avoid speaking at all costs, while Drew was picking at his meal, looking nervously around the kitchen on occasion. He tried to open his mouth to start speaking a couple of times, during which Nevin immediately responded by shoving more food in his face.  
  
Drew took a deep breath, furrowing his brow. It had to be addressed, and it would never happen if he didn’t try to bring it up.  
  
“Uh, Nev…” he started. Nevin winced. “Is there something we have to talk about…?”  
  
Nevin looked away, pretending to be distracted by something outside the window. He was hunched over his plate, leaning his head into his hand. “Is there?”  
  
“Do you really think that I didn’t hear any of that stuff that just happened?” Drew asked.  
  
Nevin winced. “… It would be a surprise if you didn’t,” he mumbled. He shifted his glance over in the opposite direction, still not making eye contact. “You were in your room the entire time, right?”  
  
“I would’ve come downstairs if it didn’t take so much effort,” Drew told him, leaning back in his chair, eyes darting for just a moment over to the crutches that were laid across the chair next to him. “Besides. Grandma asked me to vacuum the game room, so I was getting it out of the way.”  
  
“Even though your leg is broken?” Nevin asked, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“Something about ‘back in my day we didn’t have running water’ and yada yada,” Drew said, waving his hand. “Anyway, why was there a girl in our house, why did everyone else come over and why was there so much yelling outside?”  
  
Nevin finally looked over at him. "You didn’t… hear what we were talking about, did you?” he asked him.  
  
“No, I couldn’t hear anything. But I would really like answers.” Drew leaned over into his hand, tapping the table slightly.  
  
“There was, uh… this girl,” Nevin started, his eye contact diverting again. “Showed up at the door. I think she was a stalker.”  
  
“You have a stalker?” Drew asked.  
  
“A-And, I didn’t know what to do,” Nevin continued, sitting up. “So I called Chris, and he brought Isaac along for some reason.”  
  
“Uh… Isaac is the guy with his hair tied back, right?” Drew questioned.  
  
“Yeah, that guy. They came over for like… moral support. And we all scared her off. And I told her I was gay, she flipped out and it was really hilarious. Anyway, she’s gone now, and I doubt we’ll ever have to worry about that again.” He picked up the glass next to his plate and consumed the beverage within.  
  
“Scared her off,” Drew repeated. “That was a lot of screaming, you know. I’m sure you really achieved something there.” He narrowed his eyes a little.  
  
“… We had to use the hose,” Nevin told him.  
  
Drew raised an eyebrow, quiet for a few moments. “… You deflected a stalker with a hose. You know, I’m not even going to ask anymore.”  
  
It was evident that he was suspicious of Nevin’s dishonesty, but Drew decided against pursuing it any further. He stood up on one leg, grabbing one of his crutches to support himself and picking up his dishes with his other hand.  
  
“Let me get that for you,” Nevin started, reaching for the dishes, but Drew recoiled, shaking his head.  
  
“No, I’m fine,” he said, making his way over to the sink and dishwasher. Nevin frowned, sitting back down and staring down at his remaining food as Drew walked past him. Drew put the dishes down, turning the water on and rinsing them off, then putting them back down to turn the water off before stowing them in the dishwasher. Doing everything with one hand was a bit time consuming, but if he was able to do it, he had no reason to get help. “So, uh, Nevin. Do you intend to tell me anything about Chris coming over on Sunday?”  
  
“What?” Nevin asked, perking up. “Oh, so you did notice.”  
  
Drew rolled his eyes, letting out a laugh. “He was over for like five hours!” he said. “You guys were yelling long after we got back! The only reason Grandma didn’t walk into the room was because she was so thrilled about you actually spending time with someone.”  
  
Nevin shrugged. “Actually, it was six hours. We were playing through an entire game.”  
  
Drew looked over at him. “Oh, I know,” he said. “I know.”  
  
“What do you mean, you know?” Nevin asked him.  
  
Drew hopped around on his crutch so he was now facing his brother. “You know, I almost burst out laughing when I heard your reactions to some of those second act events.”  
  
Nevin glanced away for a moment, appearing a bit surprised. “Wait, what?”  
  
“By the way,” Drew continued, smiling. “Natsuki is the best girl.”  
  
Nevin aggressively rose to his feet, his hands on the table. “WHAT?” he asked. “FU…RICKING NATSUKI?” He spun around to face Drew. “Natsuki is whiny and obnoxious!” He stopped, taking a step back. “Wait, how do you even know this?”  
  
“Nevin, I played the game two weeks ago,” Drew told him, picking up his other crutch. “We own it on Steam.”  
  
Nevin paused.  
  
“You downloaded a separate version, didn’t you.”  
  
Nevin’s mouth spread into a flat line.  
  
“… I am still mortally offended by you siding with Natsuki,” he commented. “I’m not partial to any of them but Natsuki is the worst.”  
  
“I think Natsuki is just really misunderstood, she has a hard life and is just trying to be normal and have friends but everyone else’s shenanigans are preventing that,” Drew said curtly. “Plus she’s small and cute and I want to give her a hug.”  
  
Nevin squinted.  
  
“Anyway, I’m gonna go take a shower.” Drew hopped his way out of the room and back towards the stairs.  
  
Nevin collapsed back down into his chair much more loudly than intended. Not only was he surprised that Drew had already played the game, but he was rather astonished that Drew stopped asking questions considering how ridiculous his excuse was.  
  
It didn’t feel right, however. Almost as if Drew was starting to lose trust in him.  
  
… well, rightfully so. Nevin had to lie every time something relevant to the supernatural things going on came up and he did not have much confidence in his ability to divert the subject.  
  
Though, it wasn’t like he had been doing it for an extended period of time. Before, all he had to do was keep a secret. Then, out of nowhere, he was being bombarded by event after event after event; events so obvious it was almost impossible to hide them from Drew.  
  
Why was this town so weird? And why did all of its weirdness suddenly become accentuated when the _school king_ of all people hopped into the picture?  
  
Nevin always thought Error was strange–and an asshole–from the moment they moved to Foxfield, but suddenly, it was almost like the supernatural was encompassing him and an unlucky handful of people, Nevin included. He’d never even seen so many odd things in once place before, and he hadn't even encountered much else relevant since… he and Drew lived with their mom.  
  
He shook his head, rising to his feet to load the dishwasher with whatever remained of breakfast. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he continued to clean.  
  
He wasn’t going to think about it.  
  
He wasn’t.  
  
He wasn’t.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Edward.”  
  
The moment he entered the house, Error winced and froze in place.  
  
Oh no. It was the _tone_.  
  
His stepmother was standing in front of him, her hands on her hips as she looked up at him. She didn’t look angry, but she did look a bit impatient.  
  
“… Hi Janet,” Error said, giving a short, nervous wave. “Don’t you have work?”  
  
“I’m off today,” she answered. “That aside, I need to fulfill my responsibility as your evil stepmother and give you chores.”  
  
Error rolled his eyes. “Oh joy.”  
  
“Hey. Don’t hold it against me, buddy,” Janet told him, holding her hands up defensively. “Your father said the basement was a mess so I need help cleaning it. It would really make his day if it got cleaned, so can you _please_ be a sweetheart and help me?”  
  
Error let out a disgruntled whine.  
  
“Oh, don’t give me that. I’ll make cookies if you help me.”  
  
“Fine," Error grumbled. “But I have an idea that’ll make our lives significantly easier.”  
  
Janet raised an eyebrow as Error pulled out his phone and started texting. “What?” she asked. Error his phone up to her, revealing the text that he had just sent to his minion group. Janet squinted at the message.  
  
_“My stepmom needs help cleaning our basement. The reward is free cookies”_  
  
Within a few seconds, manly war cries were heard from outside. Error smiled ingenuously as Janet looked out the window and saw five teenaged boys best described as huge hurtling towards their house. She looked back at Error, the look on her face now flat with lack of surprise.  
  
“Might want to make extra cookies,” Error said, pocketing his phone.  
  
“I should just make those kids clean the whole damn house,” Janet grumbled as Error went to go get the door. His five minions were crowded on the porch already.  
  
Error scanned the group of boys. “Yo. Where’s Justin.”  
  
“He’s visiting his grandparents in Oregon, man,” one of his minions answered. "The moment we went on break he freakin’ bolted.”  
  
“Oh. Well good on him,” Error answered. “You guys ready to clean a basement?”  
  
“COOKIES!” Cody cheered, pumping his fists in the air.  
  
“Thank you Cody. Onward!”  
  
Error stepped out of the way and his lackeys marched into the house, making their way towards the basement. Error followed behind them, the smuggest of expressions on his face as he looked over at Janet.  
  
“Are you even going to do anything?” Janet asked him.  
  
Error shrugged. “Maybe,” he answered.  
  
“Because I’m not,” Janet continued, turning on her heel and walking towards the kitchen. “I’m making cookies. I’m putting you in charge of making sure everything goes in the right place.”  
  
“Great. Make sure you don’t put nuts or peanut butter in them, because Louis is allergic to pretty much every conventional nut that exists,” Error said.  
  
“Good thing I wasn’t going to anyway,” Janet told him, still walking.  
  
“Just making sure.”  
  
-  
-  
  
“Yo, Isaac,” Cross started, setting his controller down. “Do you… want to play something else?” They were situated in the living room and had been playing multiplayer Lego games for a while.  
  
“Hmmmm…” Ink hummed, leaning his head onto the back of the couch. “I guess.” He jumped back up. “Wait. You know what I strangely have a desire to do?”  
  
“Wha?” Cross asked.  
  
“Make M &M cookies while playing 2000s music.”  
  
Cross snorted. “That’s an oddly specific thing to want to do,” he said. “Are you allowed to just randomly make stuff?”  
  
“Yeah, definitely, as long as there’s some leftover and it’s all cleaned up,” Ink replied, getting to his feet and turning the game off before making his way to the kitchen. Cross followed suit.  
  
It was strange. Cross had an odd underlying feeling of uncertainty since he had gotten here, and he wasn’t sure where it came from. Perhaps he was still concerned about Ink being mad at him for what happened the other day. Ink had said it wasn’t a big deal at all, but it was still bugging Cross.  
  
There was something about that day in particular, as well. Somehow it was still awkward. They were barely conversing and almost every interaction they tried to have trailed off eventually.  
  
“ **Still bothering you, hmm?** ” Charlie’s voice echoed, the ghost child appearing next to him. Cross didn’t even look at him, continuing to follow Ink and stopping at the kitchen table. “ **You think he’s mad at you, Cross? Maybe he’ll realize what kind of person you really are and turn his back on you like everyone else did.** ”  
  
“Shut up Charlie,” Cross grumbled, his fingers twitching on the table. Ink turned around, a slight amount of confusion in his eyes. “… Sorry.”  
  
“Oh yeah, that’s the ghost kid, right?” Ink asked, pulling a beautifully huge bag of M&Ms out of the cupboard and looking at the back for a recipe. “So do you have to listen to him talk like, all the time?”  
  
“Basically,” Cross said, sitting down at the table. “And he’s really annoying sometimes. It’s like his perpetual goal is to make me suffer because somehow his condition is my fault.” He shook his head, bringing his forehead to his palm. “I’m sorry. I’m complaining.”  
  
“I mean, I’m not blaming you, man,” Ink told him, starting to pull out ingredients. “That’s gotta suck. I wonder if there’s a way to get him out of you.”  
  
“ **ME TOO!** ” Charlie yelled loudly enough for Cross to wince. “ **This is why we need to find the other half of Overwrite so we can fix this crap! God, I get so frustrated every time I think about it because he freaking hid it!** ”  
  
"… And Charlie continues to ramble about how he hid that other half of that whole power that I explained a while back,” Cross said, rolling his eyes.  
  
“Hid it? What exactly even is it?” Ink asked him.  
  
“ **It’s a plasmatic composition of energy and live data!** ” Charlie declared. “ **It's supposed to be like a mixture of the computers, the physical world and the supernatural! It’s weird stuff and I don’t really get it but I’m like twelve, I don’t know anything.** ”  
  
Cross shrugged. “Some sciency supernatural shit.”  
  
“That’s vague,” Ink said, letting out a laugh as he turned the oven on.  
  
“I’ve never seen it, man. The only reason I even believe it exists is because I have half of it.”  
  
“ **I HAVE HALF OF IT,** ” Charlie corrected. “ **IT’S MINE. Your unauthorized pretty boy face can’t use it!** "  
  
Cross furrowed his brow, glancing over skeptically at the ghost floating next to him.  
  
“Charlie, go take a nap or something,” he said. Ink looked over at where Cross’s gaze was, curiously raising an eyebrow.  
  
“ **You can’t make me!** ” Charlie asserted, doing the ghost equivalent of sprawling across the kitchen table, which was hovering slightly above it.  
  
Cross let out a huff of air, getting up and making his way over to Ink, making sure his back was turned to Charlie. Charlie rolled over, putting his chin against his hands.  
  
“Please give me a reason to ignore him,” Cross said.  
  
Ink turned on the oven and pulled some measuring cups out of a nearby drawer. “Well, uh… since you ask,” he said, letting out a laugh. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’ve been actually meaning to ask you something. Like… on a remotely serious note.”  
  
“… What is it?” Cross asked.  
  
“I know we’ve been joking about like, uh… Nevin,” Ink continued. Cross could feel something in him sink, and he wasn’t entirely sure why. “What do you actually think about him?”  
  
Cross was silent for a few seconds. “… We’re friends,” he said.  
  
“Do you want me to stop joking about… all that?” Ink asked him. “Is that weird? I mean, it just… occurred to me, I dunno what… direction you actually go in?” He started trailing off, uncertainty filling his tone.  
  
“Oh, no, uh…” Cross started, looking down. “I’m bi, but I don’t see Nevin like that. Plus, we hardly even know each other.”  
  
They were both quiet, a painfully awkward silence filling the room. Charlie raised an eyebrow from his position on the table.  
  
“ **Gay,** ” Charlie said. Cross’s eye twitched.  
  
Charlie hovered up behind him as Ink started to mix ingredients together. Cross pulled out his phone to play the 2000s music as planned. He pretended to ignore the ghost child floating next to him, turning his head away.  
  
“ **You know that’s another reason why I want to get out of you,** ” Charlie told him. “ **You’re not allowed to be in any relationships until we’re separate, especially not one with another _dude_.** ”  
  
Cross turned the music on, placing his phone on the counter and continuing to try and disregard the voice echoing in his ears.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Yo boss, what are these?”  
  
“James, you know you don’t have to call me that, we’re at–“ Error started, coming over to where his minion was, but paused. He crouched down in front of the small box.  
  
It seemed to be filled with pictures and small albums. Error pulled one of the pictures out, raising an eyebrow. “Oh. This is from like eight years ago,” he said. “Man, this was a _long_ time ago. This was like, back when Blueberry actually played sports.”  
  
“Oh yeah, the guy who knows everything?” James asked.  
  
“The Lorekeeper,” Louis said dramatically. “Long ago, prior to the reign of our king, they were the closest of friends. Alas, the demands of the great responsibility has weighed down on this relationship.”  
  
“Uh… sure,” Error replied, looking back down at the picture. The smaller versions of him and Blueberry gazed back at him, both grinning ear to ear about what Error somewhat recalled to be a hockey game victory.  
  
A lot of people believed that those two had drifted apart since they were scarcely seen together at school, but in reality, far less had changed than what appeared to. Sure, they didn’t hang out nearly as often, but Error knew that he could still depend on Blue if the going got tough, and that was a good thing.  
  
Error pulled out more pictures, flipping through them.  
  
The two of them posing at the top of a hill during a hike…  
  
The two of them doing what looked like a signature handshake…  
  
The two of them fighting with breadsticks at a restaurant…  
  
A series of pictures of Error pushing Blue into a lake and Blue subsequently climbing out and pushing him in…  
  
“Oh right, I remember from what all these were from,” Error started. “There was this one summer where Blueberry’s parents were gone for like a month and he stayed with us. Man, that was before Geno was even born.”  
  
Error flipped to the next picture, seeing that it was a picture of him and Blue sleeping on what was their old couch by then, himself passed out on Blue’s shoulder. He squinted at the picture.  
  
“Janet,” he grumbled.  
  
Error put all the pictures back, picking up the box and standing up with it. He walked over and put the box on top of a pile of things labeled with a piece of paper reading “Error’s old shit” taped above it.  
  
He may have had to remind himself to look through the rest of those with Blue.  
  
-  
-  
  
“Isn’t it…”  
  
Blueberry’s head snapped up, suddenly hearing the voice of the one leaning on his shoulder, whom his arm was around.  
  
“Wha?” he asked, turning his gaze to face the girl next to him.  
  
“I was just thinking about something totally irrelevant to this,” she said, making a face as her eyes remained locked on the TV screen currently playing a classic movie, for a lack of either of them thinking of anything different to watch. “You like, keep track of a huge amount of people’s information, right? In the school and all.”  
  
“… Sort of?” Blue responded doubtfully.  
  
“Isn’t that kinda weird?” she asked.  
  
“I don’t keep anything that makes it messed up,” Blue told her. “I just really like to know the people around me.”  
  
The girl let out a hum, before letting out a huff of air. “Did you know who I was before we actually met?”  
  
“… Maybe by name.”  
  
“That’s it?”  
  
“And I knew you were in the cheer squad at the time.”  
  
“Oh come on,” the girl continued, looking over at him. “Everyone knew that stuff.”  
  
Blueberry raised an eyebrow. “What, do you want me to be creepy and tell you that I knew you had a golden retriever named Harold?” he asked.  
  
The girl snorted. “Okay, maybe that’s enough,” she replied. She let out a long sigh, turning her head forward again. “Man, I’m still really messed up over what happened and I wasn’t even there. I can’t believe Dez succeeded in summoning something and that guy _happened_ to text you of all people about it. He’s lucky that I was here.”  
  
“Stacy, I might’ve been able to come to that conclusion regardless,” Blue told her, laughing.  
  
Stacy gave him a push. “And you made it look like you did.”  
  
“Hey, you said you wanted to deny all involvement in that earlier,” Blueberry added, giving her a small push back. “Just fulfilling your request, sweetheart.”  
  
“I didn’t think any of that was going to happen,” Stacy said, pouting.  
  
“All right Stacy, you’re the big hero,” Blue told her, brushing over her long brown hair. “I’ll make sure you get some credit, okay?”  
  
Stacy let out a disgruntled whine as Blue leaned in and gave her a kiss on the temple. She turned towards him, pursing her lips.  
  
“Whatever. As long as we’re not under attack by some demon spawn of an anime girl,” she said. “Sometimes I wonder why I still hang out with Dez. She's kinda crazy.”  
  
“Sometimes we stick around crazy people for reasons we can’t understand,” Blue replied. “But hey. You’ve gotta have some reason, right?”  
  
Stacy shrugged. “Maybe.”  
  
They leaned a bit closer, their lips meeting for a second. They both smiled, giggling a little.  
  
“I don't want school to start again,” Stacy mumbled. “The break is passing way too fast.”  
  
“I mean, you could always set off another bomb in the school,” Blue said. “Maybe that’ll do something.”  
  
Stacy blinked, pausing. “I–“ she started, eyes narrowing. “You jackass. I would _not_ do that.”  
  
Blueberry snickered. “I’m just joking. It was probably the shady janitor.”  
  
Stacy rolled her eyes, turning her head and huddling up against the crook of his neck again as they both returned their attention to the movie.


	14. Quinton Junior and the Reaper

Third grade had to be the hardest thing in the _world_.  
  
Geno was sulking through the hallways, making sure everyone in the hallway could see how much he was pouting. He’d been like this all week, as were many of the other kids in the entire school–why did all the high schoolers get a break? Why couldn’t anything in the elementary school accidentally explode? It was super unfair.  
  
Without any discussion whatsoever, all of the students in the school had collectively decided that if they made enough displeased faces, they might get a break too.  
  
Geno let out an exasperated huff of air, hunching over and trudging to class with exaggerated irritability.  
  
He reached the door of his classroom, pushing the door open and plopping down in his chair right next to the door, purposefully distanced from the bright sun. Setting his small backpack down under the desk, he leaned into his hand, kicking his legs, because for some reason, the chairs at his school were that tall.  
  
Time to sit in class for a painfully long number of hours.  
  
Geno’s gaze scanned the room, looking for something interesting to pay attention to. The students were slowly filing in, all equally as dramatically frustrated, filling the room with an undeniable aura of childish displeasure.  
  
Well, except for a certain someone who quite literally skipped into the room. Geno rolled his eye, turning his attention away from the door in hopes that the boy wouldn’t pay him any notice.  
  
It was a mere fantasy, however.  
  
The boy virtually hopped over to Geno, plopping down in the seat next to him. For some reason, he was grinning ear to ear even more than usual. Geno eyed him warily, getting an ominous impression.  
  
Noticing that Geno had looked at him, the dark-skinned boy waved. “Hi Geno!” he greeted. Geno immediately diverted his sightline, looking to the front of the room again.  
  
Geno let out a long sigh. “… Reuben,” he mumbled.  
  
“That’s me!” the boy announced, bouncing in his seat.  
  
“Why are you so sunshine and rainbows. Literally everyone else is super… salty,” Geno said, looking over the room. “You can’t possibly be happy to be here.”  
  
Reuben laughed. “Maybe you’ll find out,” he said.  
  
Geno sat up slightly. “… What’s that supposed to mean? Maybe?”  
  
Reuben brought a finger to his lips, smiling. Geno raised an eyebrow as Reuben got back up, taking his backpack with him. He moved to the back of the room in the chaos of the students piling in, shutting himself in the closet.  
  
Geno blinked, watching him. He rolled his eye again, turning forward and leaning in his hand again. Reuben was weird and it wasn’t his responsibility to worry about it, right?  
  
… Right.  
  
“Okay class, everyone sit down,” the teacher said, entering the room. All the students let out an annoyed groan in unison, taking their seats. “Quiet. Everyone quiet.” The middle-aged man pulled out a clipboard. “Patricia Acker. Is Patricia Acker here?”  
  
“Here.”  
  
“ _Here we go_ ,” Geno thought. “ _Time for the eternity long roll call_.”  
  
“Britney Callis?”  
  
“Here!”  
  
As named were called out in the background, Geno pulled out a pen, set a notebook on his desk and started to doodle in it. He drew a stick figure version of himself in a cape, wielding a sword as big as his body.  
  
“… Nolan Geertgens?”  
  
“Here, whatever.”  
  
Geno started drawing a half-robotized dinosaur with wings and giant claws, not to be mistaken for a dragon. He drew Error on the other side of the dinosaur, locked in a conspicuous jail cell. Geno let out a hum, scribbling it out and drawing Error standing on top of the dinosaur instead, laughing maniacally and wearing a crown. The corner of Geno’s mouth curled up as he drew his hero-persona shooting a laser out of his false eye.  
  
“… Geno Quinton.”  
  
“Here,” Geno said, raising his hand without looking up.  
  
“Reuben K…”  
  
Suddenly, there was a thump. Geno looked up as all the students around him started to mumble, seeing the teacher collapsed on the ground.  
  
“What the heck?” Geno muttered aloud, looking around.  
  
Half of the students screamed as the lights in the room shut off. A loud boom of thunder played from within Reuben’s desk, presumably from a device that no one recalled the boy having.  
  
The closet door creaked open, claiming the attention of everyone in the room. A small, menacing figure wearing a massive cloak emerged from the little space, brandishing a scythe. The classroom went dead silent as the figure stepped forward, slowly making his way towards the teacher.  
  
Geno squinted.  
  
“Oh my god we’re gonna die,” a child squeaked from the back of the room.  
  
Reuben stopped in front of the teacher, staring him down. He raised his scythe, the classroom gasping. He stopped with the scythe in midair, before lowering it.  
  
“Just kidding,”  he said, turning around and smiling. He walked back to the closet more quickly than before, shutting himself into it.  
  
Everyone started at the door, before looking back at the teacher, who was now snoring on the floor.  
  
“… Should we like, get help or something?” one of the kids mumbled.  
  
There was silence for a few more moments.  
  
“FREEDOM!” the boy known as Nolan yelled at the top of his lungs, jumping up and pumping his fists in the air, his excessively anime blonde hair bouncing with him as he did so. Several of the other kids followed, cheering loudly.  
  
Geno simply watched with his hand hovering above his notebook as a number of the students immediately flew out the door. He furrowed his brow in confusion, standing up and walking over to the closet as everyone remaining talked among themselves. He grabbed the doorknob, turning it slightly, only for it to open itself barely enough for him to fit through and for a hand to reach out and pull him in, the door promptly closing behind him and leaving them in darkness.  
  
“Reuben, what are you doing?” Geno asked, looking less than amused.  
  
“Shh, they can’t know it was me,” Reuben said, trying to cram the cloak into his backpack.  
  
“What? It would take a whole new level of stupid to not know it was you,” Geno told him, crossing his arms. “What did you do to the teacher?”  
  
“All I did was put something in his coffee,” Reuben said, shrugging.  
  
“Okay, but… why.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
Geno raised an eyebrow. “… Because you could get in trouble for doing that to the teacher, obviously?”  
  
“What are they gonna do, make me sit in the corner for fifteen minutes?” Reuben asked. “Even if they catch me, they won’t suspend me because I don’t have any other warnings.”  
  
“Even if?” Geno asked disbelievingly. “You say that like no one knows it was you and you somehow have some way around leaving this closet without being super obvious.”  
  
“Pff, that’s simple!” Reuben told him. “I just have to walk out and act like I have no idea what’s going on if anyone is looking. It always works.”  
  
“No, I really don’t think it–”  
  
Reuben threw his backpack–stuffed needlessly full and with the handle end of the scythe protruding out of it–over his shoulder, opening the door of the closet. Some students still remained in there, looking over at him. Geno put his head in his hands from behind him.  
  
Before anyone could even say anything, a voice rang out of the speaker system.  
  
“ _Reuben Karner, please come to the principal’s office. All other students in the grade, please remain seated until further notice…_ ”  
  
Geno walked up behind Reuben, giving him a tap on the arm. “Prepare for punishment, nerd,” he said. Reuben stuck his tongue out as Geno walked back to his desk.  
  
“I’m not a nerd. You’re a nerd,” Reuben told him as he walked towards the door. “You’re the one with the glasses.”  
  
“My brother wears glasses sometimes too and he’s the king of the high school,” Geno affirmed, sitting down. “I don’t think you have any idea what you’re talking about.”  
  
Reuben was quiet for a moment as he continued walking. He stopped at the door. “Well, you can’t go outside in the sun for too long without fainting. So maybe you’re not a nerd, but you’re a vampire.”  
  
Geno winced, clenching his fists against his desk as he sat up, his chair skidding back loudly on the ground. “I have photophobia! Shove off!”  
  
The other students who were still seated looked at each other, feeling the tension in the room rise.  
  
“Photophobia? That makes it sound like you’re scared of pictures.”  
  
“Well, that’s _not_ what it means! It means a sensitivity to light!”  
  
Reuben rolled his eyes. “Also a sensitivity to jokes, I guess? Chill out.”  
  
A younger boy with short black hair stood up on the other side of the room, walking over to them. “Reuben, please go to the principal’s office,” he said calmly, a small Chinese accent occupying his high voice. “You might get into more trouble if you take too long.”  
  
Reuben let out a huff of air. “Whatever,” he said, pushing the door open and leaving.  
  
Geno was still clenching his fists, glaring at the door. He let out a frustrated growl, slumping back into the chair behind him.  
  
“I’m sorry he said those things to you,” the other boy said, a sad look in his dark eyes. “Your condition must be hard on you.”  
  
Geno’s gaze trailed to the corner of the room. “Yeah, my condition… sure,” he said, trailing off. He looked over at the boy. “Thanks, uh… Cory. That was probably about to get worse.” Cory nodded.  
  
Before anything else could happen, some other adults finally barged into the room, capturing everyone’s attention. They circled around the still-unconscious teacher, sitting him up and trying to get his attention, but it yielded no response.  
  
“Should we call 911?” one of the adults suggested.  
  
“Better safe than sorry,” another one said, pulling out a phone.  
  
“Do we get to go home?” one of the kids in the room asked probably much more loudly than necessary, with a very stereotypical whine in his voice.  
  
“No, stay seated and someone else will come in and substitute for the remainder of school. Those who already left are getting detention for four days, so thank you for being responsible.”  
  
All of the kids groaned.  
  
-  
-  
  
It took about an hour and a half before their grade actually resumed as normal. Reuben returned from the principal’s office before that, as did many of the other kids that had already left–begrudgingly or not. With no adults in the room for a while, the kids ended up playing a very intense game of improvised Mario Party on the desks.  
  
When another adult finally entered the room, the kids were standing on the tables and every single one of them had an expression like they’d been caught stealing candy.  
  
The woman who had entered narrowed her eyes, processing the situation before letting out a long sigh. “Please sit down and open your math books to page 62…”  
  
“Boooo,” a chubbier kid in the corner said.  
  
“Look, I’ll order pizza for lunch if you all put your butts in your chairs and pay attention.”  
  
All the kids threw their arms in their chairs and cheered before planting themselves intently in their seats and pulling their books out.  
  
“Hehe, butts,” one of the kids said.  
  
Not even ten minutes of the class passed before Reuben passed a note to Geno from his seat beside him. Geno squinted at him, taking it while the substitute’s back was turned and she was writing something on the blackboard.  
  
_“if ur wondering what hapened in the office I got out with only a warning. haha I was right”_  
  
Geno stared at the note for a few seconds before looking back over at Reuben, who was looking innocently at the blackboard. Geno picked up his pen and scribbled out his response and gave it back to him.  
  
_“I wasn’t wondering.”_  
  
Reuben frowned slightly, glancing over at Geno who seemed to be proudly ignoring him. He pulled out another scrap of paper and wrote another note, passing it to Geno again. Geno squinted at him, quietly snatching it from him.  
  
_“ur mean”_  
  
Geno looked back up, giving Reuben a look of disbelief before rolling his eye and putting the note in his desk. He felt a tap on his leg, eye shifting down to see that Reuben was trying to give him another piece of paper.  
  
“Stop,” Geno said under his breath. “Y’know, I can get you into more trouble.”  
  
Reuben pouted slightly. “You wouldn’t do that,” he whispered.  
  
“Wanna bet?”  
  
The other boy let out a small, disgruntled growl, turning his attention forward again. He briefly shook his head.  
  
Geno let out a huff. “I didn’t think so,” he said almost inaudibly, returning to his doodling.  
  
-  
-  
  
The time for pizza finally arrived. Many of the third graders scrambled out of their seats as the substitute teacher reentered, conspicuously carrying several boxes of pizza that she had picked up from the entrance. They circled around her like puppies, yelling for food.  
  
Geno had remained seated, watching the chaos unfold. He slowly stood up, making his way towards the front and bouncing on his heels to try and see above the taller kids. Reuben walked up behind him, arms crossed, and tapped on Geno’s shoulder. Geno turned his head, his brow furrowing.  
  
“What,” he said.  
  
“What’s your problem?” Reuben asked.  
  
“What’s _my_ problem?” Geno asked him in response. “Why am I the one with a problem?”  
  
“It’s because your brother is the high school king, isn’t it?” Reuben continued. “You think that you can do whatever you want and that you’re somehow allowed to be mean.”  
  
Geno whirled around, taking a step towards Reuben, who backed up in return. “Ed doesn’t have anything to do with this. I tried to be patient but you wouldn’t leave me alone.” He continued to step forward as Reuben moved back, catching the attention of a few people. “ _You’re_ the one with a problem. You don’t even realize how annoying you are,” he snarled.  
  
“ _Quinton_ ,” the teacher interrupted loudly. All of the students surrounding her stopped, their heads turning towards Geno. Geno winced, slowly turning around to see everyone’s eyes on him. “Is there something that we need to talk about?”  
  
The pale boy frowned, his face scrunching slightly. He eyed Reuben for a moment before looking back forward again. “Reuben has been harassing me since school started. He keeps trying to bother me during class and he’s making it hard to focus!”  
  
“No I don’t!” Reuben piped up.  
  
Geno glared at him. “Liar!”  
  
“Well,” the substitute started. “I think you two need to pay a visit to the counselor’s office, wouldn’t you say?” She looked at her watch. “Oh. Look at the time. It’s lunch. Perfect. You two can go now.”  
  
“But–pizza–!” Reuben whined, stepping forward towards the teacher’s desk as kids pulled slices out of the boxes laid on it.  
  
“You’re going _now_ ,” the substitute affirmed.  
  
-  
-  
  
Geno and Reuben were sitting on opposite ends of the row of chairs outside their school’s counseling office.  
  
“This is your fault,” Reuben said.  
  
“How is it my fault? That only happened because of you,” Geno replied indignantly.  
  
The door of the counselor’s office opened, a young man who appeared about twenty-five behind it. “All right you two, come in,” he said. Geno and Reuben dragged themselves into the office, collapsing into the chairs set in front of the desk as the counselor sat back down. “Now, since this is the first and hopefully last time you will be here, my name is Mr. Young. But, because I’d rather get rid of this atmosphere of professionalism since it’s an elementary school, you can call me Cooper.”  
  
Neither of the boys said anything, refusing to make eye contact with the counselor or each other.  
  
“Why don’t we start with discussing what exactly the issue is?” Cooper asked. He leaned over his desk, interlacing his fingers. “Maybe that’s too forward.” He picked up a piece of paper, scanning over it. “Geno. What’s bugging you at this current moment?”  
  
Geno contemptuously raised two fingers. “Well, for starters,” he said, “ _he_ has gotten me into this mess. Two, he made us miss the pizza!”  
  
Cooper raised an eyebrow, glancing over at Reuben before looking back at Geno. “And how, exactly, did he get you into this.”  
  
“He won’t stop bothering me all the time!” Geno declared. Reuben looked down, a glare still in his eyes. “I’m just trying to mind my own business and he keeps poking me and talking to me and then he has the nerve to say that I’m the one who has problems because I told him to stop!”  
  
Reuben’s head shot back up. “That’s not what happened!” he protested. “You threatened to tattle on me about passing notes when you were passing notes too!”  
  
Geno clenched his teeth. “Only because you wouldn’t let me ignore you! You do this all the time!”  
  
“Okay, _listen_ ,” Cooper started, much more loudly than the two young boys to get their attention. “I haven’t heard much, but I’m certain at this point that you’re both in the wrong here in one way or another. And for the record, you’re not leaving this office until we come to a consensus.”  
  
“A what?” Reuben asked.  
  
“An _agreement_ ,” Geno told him snidely, crossing his arms. He leaned towards Reuben slightly, chin forward. “A _peace treaty_. Which is not happening!” He turned away, letting out a huff of air. “I didn’t do anything except tell the truth! You’re the one who drugged the teacher and came out dressed as the _grim reaper_ just for kicks! How am I the one at fault? Plus, he made fun of me for having photophobia and albinism!”  
  
“I didn’t do that!” Reuben objected, whirling towards him. “I mean, I did the first thing, but I was not making fun of you! They were just jokes and you just have no sense of humor!” He stood up from his chair, taking a step closer to Geno, who was seated a pace away from him. Cooper sighed, leaning back in his own chair. “All I’ve wanted is to be friends with you, Geno, but you take everything I say badly!”  
  
“Look, you two,” Cooper started, sitting up and putting his hand on Reuben’s shoulder to seat him again. “I’m going to be honest. This problem is easy to solve. Both of you need to stop talking to each other and take some time to cool off. Okay? I understand that you’ve had some struggles, but Reuben, maybe it would be better for you to leave Geno alone right now. If he’s not being friendly towards you, you need to understand the signs.”  
  
“Exactly!” Geno said, throwing one of his arms up.  
  
“And Geno,” Cooper continued, looking him straight in the eye. “Thinking someone is annoying is not a reason to get angry at them. You can nicely ask them to leave you alone. Your life will be a lot easier if you learn to not let things bother you, and to not make yourself the victim all the time.”  
  
“So what, I’m just supposed to take the blame for things that aren’t my fault?” Geno asked angrily.  
  
“No,” Cooper told him. “I’m just saying to pay a little more attention to when things are your fault. I won’t make any accusations. We just all need a little more peace in our lives.”  
  
Geno looked away, letting out a ‘hmph’. “Whatever.”  
  
“Say you’re going to try. It’s not always about getting your way.”  
  
“… Fine,” Geno mumbled. “I’ll _try_.”  
  
The moment the two of them were allowed to exit the office after a few more minutes of lecturing, Geno was about to storm off back in the direction of the classroom, but was surprised when he felt Reuben grabbing his wrist. Geno frowned, turning his head only slightly and furrowing his brow.  
  
“Didn't you hear anything that he just said,” Geno said, trying to pull his arm away, but to little avail. “Lemme go.”  
  
“I just wanted to tell you something before you left,” Reuben started, his grip as tight as an eight year-old could manage. “About why I picked you, of all people.”  
  
“What, because I _stand out_?” Geno asked bitterly.  
  
“… Maybe sort of,” Reuben said under his breath. He looked down. “Whatever… I probably can’t trust you enough to tell you anyway. Forget it.” He let go of Geno, walking around him.  
  
Geno whirled around in the direction the other boy walked off in, a confused look on his face. He could feel his curiosity piquing. He let out a bit of a groan, clenching his fists and following Reuben.  
  
“Hey. _Hey_. Hold on,” Geno said as they continued walking. “You can’t just say that and not tell me.”  
  
Reuben stopped, turning around. “I’m not going to tell you. I bet you’ll try and use it against me somehow,” he replied.  
  
“Look, I’m _sorry_ about that,” Geno told him. “That wasn’t right, okay? I won’t do it again. I won’t tell secrets about people to try and ruin them.”  
  
Reuben’s eyes lit up a little, but only for a moment. He looked on both sides of himself, pulling Geno to the side of the hall next to the ends of some lockers. Geno looked at him warily, when Reuben leaned up to his hear and put his hand next to his mouth as he whispered.  
  
“Do you believe in superpowers?” he asked.  
  
Geno’s eyes widened as Reuben backed away. “… Superpowers?” he questioned. “That’s out of nowhere.”  
  
“Do you?” Reuben asked again, still quietly. “Do you think they’re real?”  
  
Geno opened his mouth, then closed it again. He made a face as he pondered the question. “… I don’t know.”  
  
“I think you have superpowers.”  
  
Geno’s gaze shot up, his jaw dropping. “What??” Reuben promptly shushed him, holding a finger up to his own lips. “But I’m…” Geno started again, a bit more quietly. “I’m so… weak, though!”  
  
“You never get sick,” Reuben told him. “Ever.”  
  
“I’m always sick!”  
  
“But you never catch anything else.”  
  
Geno furrowed his brow. “How is that a superpower? There’s nothing super about that.”  
  
“Listen. That’s not it,” Reuben continued. “I don’t know if you noticed. Remember that time you scraped your knee really badly? And you came back to school the next day and it was totally gone. Like nothing happened.”  
  
Geno looked away for a moment, then back at the other. “… Is that weird?”  
  
“Dude. That should’ve taken _way longer_ to get better,” Reuben answered. “More than a week or something.”  
  
The pale boy looked down at his hands. “… Wow. Maybe I do have superpowers.” He lifted his head back up, a curious look on his face. “… So, what does this have to do with you again?”  
  
Reuben smiled for a moment, a sly look on his face. “I have them too. And I haven’t told _anyone_ , until now.”  
  
Geno leaned closer. “… What are they?” he asked.  
  
“… Well, they aren’t very good superpowers,” Reuben said, his smile diminishing slightly. “I, uh… they’re bad.”  
  
Geno tilted his head slightly. “How so?”  
  
Reuben was quiet for a moment, biting his lip. “I can make people hurt just by _touching_ them. And not just people, but anything alive. It’s not really random, but um… I can make it happen if I think hard enough.”  
  
“Wait, so you’re like a _psychic_?” Geno asked him.  
  
The other boy looked confused. “… I’m like a Pokemon?”  
  
Geno looked at Reuben suspiciously, putting his hands in the middle pocket of his oversized hoodie. “… Prove it,” he said.  
  
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Reuben replied immediately.  
  
Geno snorted. “Not on me, stupid. Do it on a plant or something.”  
  
Reuben let out a hum, looking off in the direction of the classroom. “… Do you think there’s any pizza left?” he asked.  
  
“We were gone for like twenty minutes, no way,” Geno replied. “Come on. You can just test it on one of the plants in Mr. Henderson’s weird mini garden in the bathroom.”  
  
“Uh–okay–” Reuben didn’t object and started to follow the other as he was somewhat aggressively prompted along. Geno pulled him into the nearby bathroom, walking over to the inconspicuous door inside it with a large sign on it reading ‘no entry’. For some reason, it was unlocked regardless.  
  
Inside was a small room holding a similar style to the bathroom with several tables in it, all with miscellaneous potted plants on top of them. They looked poorly tended to, and the fact that the only source of light in the room was from the small windows at the back of the room wasn’t helping with that.  
  
“All right,” Geno said, tilting his head towards the room. “Do your thing.”  
  
Geno followed Reuben further into the room. The other boy seemed to be looking for an inconspicuous plant, locating one in the corner. He took a deep breath and reached towards it, Geno watching intently as Reuben’s fingers came in contact with its small leaves. Reuben furrowed his brow, staring at the plant with some level of willpower.  
  
One of the leaves twitched.  
  
Then another, and another.  
  
The edges of the leaves slowly started to shrivel up and Reuben quickly recoiled his hand as it happened. They withered for a few more moments before it stopped.  
  
“… You did that,” Geno started slowly, raising an eyebrow as he observed. “… with your mind?”  
  
“I guess?” Reuben replied, still looking down at his hand. “I mean, yeah.”  
  
Geno was quiet for a few moments. He looked to the corner of the room before bringing his gaze back to Reuben’s. “… Well. Maybe you should have said something earlier. Then maybe I would’ve thought you were cool before.”  
  
“I’ve always thought you were cool,” Reuben told him quickly. “Even if you didn’t have powers, I uh…”  
  
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Geno interrupted him, crossing his arms. “You might’ve thought you were joking earlier but you insulted me, and I think you’ll have to make it up to me, _grim reaper_.”  
  
“H-huh?” Reuben stammered. “How?”  
  
Geno started strolling off in the direction of the door. “I dunno. I’ll figure it out. For the record, though, no bugging me in class.”  
  
Reuben pouted slightly. “All you’re doing is doodling anyway,” he said.  
  
“And I need all my attention to go into that doodling, thanks. At least I can listen to the teacher while drawing. Now come on.”  
  
The other boy let out a bit of an excited squeal, hopping up behind Geno, who was strutting out already.  
  
“Does this mean we can be friends now?” Reuben asked him.  
  
Geno let out a sarcastic laugh.  
  
“Don’t get your hopes up,” he answered.


End file.
